Preamble

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

DEATH OF A MEMBER

Mr. SPEAKER made the following communication to the House:

I regret to have to inform the House of the death of Captain Hubert Duggan, Member for the County of Middlesex (Acton Division), and I desire, on behalf of the House, to express our sense of the loss we have sustained and our sympathy with the relatives of the hon. Member.

NEW WRIT (WOOLWICH, WEST DIVISION)

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That Mr. Speaker do issue his Warrant to the Clerk of the Crown to make out a new Writ for the electing of a Member to serve in this present Parliament for the Borough of Woolwich (West Division), in the room of the Right Hon. Sir Kingsley Wood, deceased."—[Mr. James Stuart.]

Sir Richard Acland: On this occasion I feel there are good grounds for asking for a reasonable postponement of this Writ, and, if that is not granted, for opposing it. There is a printed Bill, which, I do not think it is any great secret, will be passed in a matter of weeks. Within two weeks of the passing of that Bill the electors of Woolwich could vote on an up-to-date Register. I am entirely

disinterested in this particular constituency. So far as one can see, it is going to be contested by two candidates, between whom I should find it difficult, although perhaps not impossible, to choose. But, as a matter of principle, I feel that the electors of Woolwich should be given the best possible opportunity of choosing between those candidates. When this principle was first raised, those who took, broadly speaking, a similar point of view to mine were in a difficult position; we were really asking for the constituency to be left without a Member for perhaps months. But that is not the case to-day. I ask for the electors of Woolwich to be left without a Member of Parliament only for a few weeks. I acknowledge that that is a disadvantage, but something of the sort has happened before, and nobody has complained. Sometimes, when the party concerned has desired to bring a candidate home from the ends of the earth, a Writ has not been issued for months, purely for the convenience of the party which happened to be concerned. Sometimes, when Members have died in the middle of a long Parliamentary vacation, months have gone by—during which it has been possible, technically, I believe, to get a Writ moved—and nobody has moved a Writ, and nobody has complained. So this loss is indeed a small one, which has often been shared by electors in other constituencies. For that loss—a trivial one—of being without representation in this House for a few weeks, the electors will get the opportunity to express their democratic views on a Register as up to date as the wit of the


Home Secretary and the wisdom of this House can make it, instead of having to make up their minds somehow on a Register which, in all parts of this House and by all sections of the community, is regarded as archaic. Therefore, I suggest that this Writ should be moved on the day after the Bill which is now printed has become law.

The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): The hon. Member, I think, has forgotten that the passing of a Bill does not put all the machinery into operation. The passing of the Bill is one thing, and the machinery then has to be set up for putting it into operation. [Interruption.] I have my information. It will take a considerable time to get that machinery in motion. I think the hon. Member is mistaken in saying that it will take only a few weeks.

Sir R. Acland: Seven and a half weeks.

Mr. Attlee: I think it would be unjust to withhold the issue of Writs for constituencies just because they happen to fall vacant at the time of the introduction of this Bill.

Mr. Loverseed: Is it not a fact that the Register may be issued within a matter of days; that the particulars are, in fact, in the hands of the food offices, and that the returning officers at the present moment hold the duplicates of these particulars, which could be issued in a matter of days?

Mr. William Brown: I have taken part in a great many by-elections in the past few months, and, in my experience, there has been no feature which has caused more popular anger than the out-of-date nature of the register. It is a matter of bitter comment that practically everybody under the age of 27 is disfranchised, and that the soldiers who are fighting in the war have no opportunity of voting. In those by-elections it was impossible to do anything about it; but in this by-election, and in subsequent ones, it is possible to do something. I assert that upon the decision as to whether this Writ is taken to-day or a few weeks hence may depend the choice between the candidates at Woolwich. In many by-elections the result of the contest would have been quite different if the decision had been made on an up-to-date register. It is not

a question of seeing that Woolwich is represented quickly, but of seeing that it is represented rightly and democratically. If the matter is carried to a Division, I shall vote against the Government.

Question put.

The House proceeded to a Division, and Mr. SPEAKER stated that he thought the "Ayes" had it, and, on his decision being challenged, it appeared to him that the Division was unnecessarily claimed, and he accordingly called upon the Members who supported and who challenged his decision successively to rise in their places, and he declared the "Ayes" had it, eleven Members only who challenged his decision having stood up.

Sir R. Acland: On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. I do not question the general propriety of saving the time of the House, because it is valuable, but the point of a Division is to record the names of those who have voted. I remember a day in the time of your predecessor when the I.L.P. were in the same position in which you have, quite properly, put myself and my hon. Friends, and the hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Maxton) was able in a matter of 30 seconds to have their names recorded for posterity. We have been put to this disadvantage, and I still ask whether there were not a sufficient number of hon. Members opposing this Motion for a vote to be taken and their names to be recorded?

Mr. Speaker: I asked hon. Members to rise, and it was for me to decide whether it was necessary or not to hold a Division. The responsibility was mine, and I must accept it, and I do.

Mr. W. Brown: On a further point of Order, Mr. Speaker. Is there a method by which hon. Members who wish their names to be placed on record as having opposed the Government on an issue can record their votes?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member has not only made a speech, but he has made an interruption now, and he knows perfectly well that the fact will be recorded.

Mr. Reakes: May I have my vote recorded?

Oral Answers to Questions — NEWFOUNDLAND (PARLIAMENTARY MISSION)

Mr. Maxton: asked the Under-Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs whether the Members of the Parliamentary Commission to Newfoundland have now completed their labours and returned to this country; whether they have submitted a report; and, if so, will the House have an opportunity of reading and discussing it?

The Under-Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs (Mr. Emrys-Evans): Yes, Sir. The members of the Parliamentary Mission to Newfoundland have now arrived back in this country, and I am sure that all of us in this House are delighted that they should be with us again after their long, strenuous and highly successful tour. My hon. Friend will recall that there was no intention that the Mission should present a report for publication, but the three Members have in fact produced accounts of the personal impressions and views which they formed in Newfoundland. These will be of great assistance to my Noble Friend the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs, who is most grateful for the trouble they have taken. A full opportunity will occur for them to express their views on this important problem when Commonwealth affairs come up for discussion in this House.

Mr. Maxton: May I add my felicitations for the safe return of the hon. Members, but is it not rather a scurvy way to treat three Members of this House who were sent as representing this House to make important inquiries that neither are their findings being reported to the House in writing nor are they to be given a special occasion for the discussion of the problems in Newfoundland, but are to be left merely to some casual committees which may or may not arise in the near future?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: No, Sir. The position was made quite clear by my right hon. Friend the Lord President of the Council before the Mission left, when he said:
I do not think it would be advisable for them to have to give a written report.

Mr. Maxton: They have done it.

Mr. Emrys-Evans: He did not think it advisable that it should be published; there was no question of the publication of the report.

Sir Percy Harris: Will the hon. Gentleman consult the Leader of the House and see whether this decision can be reconsidered, as the House of Commons is anxious to see these reports and is full of curiosity and would like to have the advantage of discussing them?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: No, Sir, these reports are confidential, and my noble Friend does not consider it desirable.

Sir Herbert Williams: Is it not a question therefore that these three Members of Parliament have been muzzled by Ministers and cannot, in speech, say anything they have written?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: No, Sir, the hon. Member must not come to that conclusion.

Sir H. Williams: Surely after the statement that their written report is confidential their spoken report should be confidential? How can we resolve them?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: That is not the right, conclusion. The hon. Members concerned will have an opportunity of expressing their views in any way they like during the course of the Debate which will arise in the usual way.

Mr. Shinwell: As this is a Parliamentary delegation and not a Government delegation, are not hon. Members entitled to know what their colleagues have disclosed of their visit to Newfoundland, and would my hon. Friend make representations to the appropriate quarter expressing the opinion of the House?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: No, Sir. The position was made quite clear before the party left.

Mr. Shinwell: Is my hon. Friend aware that it does not lie with him to decide what the House should do, and if the House expresses itself to the contrary he should make the necessary representations to the proper quarter, and, if he is not prepared to do that, will he step out of the way and allow us to do it?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: No, Sir. I have given the reply with regard to the view of my noble Friend. This report was a confidential report, and he does not think it desirable that it should be published.

Captain Peter Macdonald: Is it not a fact that a day has been asked for to discuss Dominion affairs, and is it proposed that conditions in Newfoundland should be discussed on that day, or are they to have a separate day for discussion? Dominion affairs have not been discussed in this House for five years, and therefore is it not important that we should have a full day for a discussion on Dominion affairs as well as a day for a discussion on Newfoundland affairs?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: That is a matter for the House.

Mr. Neil Maclean: Is it not wise to give this House an opportunity of discussing a report from a Parliamentary Mission that went out to seek certain information for the purpose of the better government of one of our dependancies? I would ask the hon. Member therefore whether, instead of being so emphatic, as he is now, he will consider taking the matter back to his superior to find out whether something can be done?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: It is not a question of one report but of three reports.

Mr. Maclean: As there is a difference of opinion, is it not all the more necessary that the matter should be brought before the House?

Mr. Molson: Are we to understand that these hon. Members were not invited either formally or informally to present any report and that these are just spontaneous expressions of opinion on their part?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: The position was made quite clear by my right hon. Friend the Lord President of the Council in a Debate on 10th June, when he used these words:
I do not think it would be advisable for them to have to give a written report."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 10th June, 1943; col. 896, Vol. 390]

Mr. Maxton: They have done so.

Mr. Molson: I understand that they have done so, and that was a spontaneous act on their part, which was neither asked for nor apparently welcomed by His Majesty's Government.

Oral Answers to Questions — DOMINIONS FORCES (VOTING BY PROXY)

Mr. Turton: asked the Under-Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs whether he has any information as to which of the

Dominions permit the members of their Forces serving outside that Dominion to record their vote at elections by post or telegraph?

Mr. Emrys-Evans: In the elections held in the four oversea Dominions during the war special arrangements were made for recording the votes of members of their Forces serving outside the Dominion, but these arrangements did not include voting by post or telegraph.

Oral Answers to Questions — TRADE AND COMMERCE

Girls' Training Corps (Clothing Coupons)

Mr. Jewson: asked the President of the Board of Trade why he will not grant to members of the Girls' Training Corps the same concessions in regard to coupons as are made to members of the youth detachments of the British Red Cross Society?

The President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Dalton): Members of the Girls' Training Corps are in the same position as members of the Junior Red Cross, who receive no coupon concessions for their uniforms.

Mr. Godfrey Nicholson: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the valuable work being done by the Girls' Training Corps and that this particular type of girl find if most difficult to provide themselves with uniform, and will he look into the matter again?

Mr. Dalton: I have looked into it from that point of view, and I have answered Questions on the subject before, and I have also been in contact with hon. Members of this House on the matter. The position is very simple. There are certain organisations, of which the Girls' Training Corps is one, which are not sponsored by any of the Service Departments. Other examples are the Boy Scouts and the Girl Guides. I fully recognise the valuable work they are doing, but the civilian ration is insufficient for any further concession to be made now, and I must continue to decline to make an exception, much as I value the work of these organisations.

Mr. Nicholson: Is not that reply equivalent to saying that the proper method of approach by the Girls' Training Corps is to one of the Service Departments in order to get recognition?

Mr. Dalton: I have not said that. I am trustee for the civil population, and I am making as fair a distribution as I can to carry out that obligation. The Service Departments have their own proper organisation for the purpose.

Armed Forces (Pyjamas)

Mr. Quintin Hogg: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is prepared to release sufficient cloth to the Services to permit other ranks in suitable cases to purchase pyjamas or to grant coupons with the same object?

Mr. Dalton: The supply of cloth for civilian clothing is barely sufficient to meet the present civilian ration, and I regret that it would be quite impossible for me, out of the civilian allocation, either to authorise the issue of coupons to other ranks for pyjamas or to spare cloth for an issue by the Services.

Mr. Hogg: Is it not the case that this distinction between officers and other ranks is a false social distinction in the Services? Would the Minister take up again with the Service Ministers the question as to whether the allocation of clothing given by him to the Services does not permit the issue of pyjamas on a limited scale to other ranks?

Mr. Dalton: I am anxious that the responsibility should be rightly adjusted in this matter. My responsibility is to the civil population. The allocation of materials to the Services is made, not by me, but by the Minister of Production, who has to hold the balance as evenly as he can between civilians on the one hand and the Services on the other. What the Services choose to make a Service issue is a matter for the Service Ministers. The decision is theirs as to what issues from the quartermaster's stores they will make. My concern is with the civilian population.

Mr. Levy: There is no scarcity of raw materials. The difficulty is in regard to the supply of labour to manufacture the raw material into finished products. Surely the Minister knows—

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member is giving information, not asking for it.

Lost Clothing Coupons

Mr. Evelyn Walkden: asked the President of the Board of Trade how the computation of a person's needs is assessed

in cases where clothing ration books are declared lost or when an application for a duplicate supply of clothing coupons is being considered?

Mr. Dalton: Lost coupons are replaced only where exceptional need for clothing is proved or where the loss is due to causes outside the owner's control. In the former case, coupons are issued to bring up the applicant's stock of clothing to a minimum essential level. In the latter case, replacement depends upon the un-expired part of the rationing period.

Mr. Walkden: While thanking my right hon. Friend for that explanation, may I ask whether that includes inspection of an applicant's wardrobe? Is it not a strange policy, in contrast to that of the Ministry of Food, which does not even check up reserve stocks in a pantry, that his Department should check up on wardrobes?

Mr. Dalton: We have to be very careful with the limited supplies available. My answers continually return to the same point. There is only a limited supply of clothing material available, and we must be careful to see that where coupons are lost—although we are most anxious to meet all the reasonable needs of-those concerned—we do not over-issue. The ration, which is based on the minimum essential needs, is quite generous; it is more than four times the ordinary basic ration.

Oral Answers to Questions — PORTUGAL (WAR MATERIALS, EXPORT TO GERMANY)

Mr. G. Strauss: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Economic Warfare the approximate amount of wolfram and other vital materials of war exported during recent years from Portugal to Germany; and whether, in view of the recent change in policy of the Portuguese Government there will be a cessation of these exports which are of such importance to the German war industry?

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Economic Warfare (Mr. Dingle Foot): Portuguese exports of wolfram to Germany amounted to 185 tons in 1940, 1,814 tons in 1941 and approximately 2,000 tons in 1942. Among other raw materials produced in Portugal, the most important for war purposes is tin.


Exports to Germany were 30 tons of tin concentrates in 1940, and a quantity of metal as to which I have no precise figures, 45 tons of concentrates and 546 tons of metal in 1941 and approximately 600 tons of metal in 1942. The recent Anglo-Portuguese Agreement with respect to the Azores does not involve any change in the commercial policy of the Portuguese Government.

Mr. Strauss: Is it not a fact that if these supplies of wolfram, tin and other metals were cut off from Portugal, it would deal a severe blow indeed at Germany's war industries? Ought not drastic steps to be taken to persuade our oldest Ally not to continue to assist Germany in this way?

Mr. Foot: I entirely agree that it would be a very heavy blow at the enemy's war effort. As regards the second part of the Supplementary Question, all I can say is that this is something which is never forgotten at any time by my Department.

Mr. Shinwell: Is it not the best kind of benevolent neutrality that we get the Azores while Germany gets the material?

Mr. Strauss: Are other Departments of the Government taking active steps to put an end to this, apart from the Parliamentary Secretary's Department?

Mr. Austin Hopkinson: Is Portugal a Sovereign State or not?

Oral Answers to Questions — OCCUPIED COUNTRIES, EUROPE

Food Supplies

Mr. Edmund Harvey: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Economic Warfare whether further consideration will now be given to the possibility of sanctioning a limited scheme for controlled food relief for supplying dried milk and vitamins to young children and nursing mothers in certain European countries now under German occupation, in view of the fact that the wheat ration has now been increased by the German authorities and the danger of diversion of food to Germany consequently lessened?

Mr. Foot: This subject was fully discussed in the House on 8th July, and I have nothing to add to what I said on that occasion.

Mr. Harvey: Has not the information been given by my hon. Friend subsequent to that Debate and does not that materially alter the situation?

Mr. Foot: The information to which my hon. Friend refers is information I gave in an answer a week or two ago to the effect that following an improved harvest in most European countries there had been a general increase in rations, particularly in the bread ration. I do not, however, think that that in any way affects the blockade policy of His Majesty's Government.

Mr. Harvey: Will not that remove any incentive to the Germans to divert supplies?

Mr. Foot: No. If my hon. Friend will look again at the answer I gave, he will see that I said that in the case of Poland, at any rate, improved crops would almost certainly lead to increased requisitioning on the part of the enemy.

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Economic Warfare to what extent the shipments of food, as increased since April and July last, satisfy the requests made by the Swedish-Swiss Commission controlling relief work in Greece?

Mr. Foot: I would refer my hon. Friend to the answers which I gave on 13th July and 14th October to my hon. Friend the Member for Evesham (Mr. De la Bère).

Mr. Sorensen: Has there been any expression of opinion by the Commission since that time? Could the hon. Member not give an approximate percentage as to the amount supplied in response to these requests?

Mr. Foot: I made it clear in my earlier answers that we had met most of the requests which had been made to us by the Commission. There was one particular request for stock-fish which for various reasons we were unable to meet, but the other requests the Commission made have been met or are still under consideration.

Mr. Sorensen: Are those still under consideration likely to be met in full in the near future?

Mr. Foot: That, I could not say.

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Parmentary Secretary to the Ministry of Economic Warfare what shipments were permitted by His Majesty's Government to pass through the blockade to Poland during the early months of the war; when were they suspended and for what reasons; whether he can give details of the operations before and after that date of the American Commission for Polish Relief, Incorporated; and whether this work was hindered or interfered with by the enemy?

Mr. Foot: Between November, 1939, and May, 1940, His Majesty's Government permitted the despatch to Poland through the blockade of relief supplies to a total value of 1,000,000 dollars. These included wheat, flour, milk, clothing and medical supplies, and were shipped through Italian ports. The shipments were discontinued when Italy entered the war and His Majesty's Government were informed by the Polish Embassy on 7th June, 1940, that the Germans had withdrawn all offers to facilitate relief in Poland. I have no details of the operation of the American Commission for Polish Relief and I am, therefore, unable to say how far its work was hindered or interfered with by the enemy.

Mr. Sorensen: Would it not be possible for my hon. Friend to make inquiries to see whether any interference was exercised?

Mr. Foot: In any case I think the experience of that Commission is quite irrelevant to the problem of food relief through the blockade. As far as I remember, the headquarters of that Commission were in Berlin, there was no adequate neutral staff to supervise distribution in Poland, and after Italy entered the war the supplies that were distributed were not brought in through the blockade but were purchased inside the blockade area. In addition the Commission were under no obligation and had no duty to protect Polish domestic produce, and therefore it seems to me that the experience of those days is no particular guide to the problem of relief to-day.

Mr. Sorensen: But does my hon. Friend not admit that there is some relevance between one matter and the other?

Civil Affairs (Administration)

Major Stourton: asked the Prime Minister whether it is the intention of His Majesty's Government to introduce civil affairs administration in due course to all allied countries at present overrun by Germany?

The Prime Minister (Mr. Churchill): This question seems to me to be premature. Full information will be given to the House should our operations prosper in any particular new theatre.

Enemy Exactions

Mr. Molson: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Economic Warfare whether he can give any information as to the amount of war indemnities and other exactions levied on the occupied countries in Europe by the Axis Governments since the date of occupation and during the last 12 months, respectively?

Mr. Foot: Up to 30th September, 1943, the total amounts levied on the occupied countries in Europe by the Axis Governments, whether by way of occupation costs or other charges is estimated at over £3,200,000,000. This is taking the mark at 13⅓ to the pound. In addition, the balances of exports received by Germany but paid for only in blocked marks are estimated at £1,300,000,000, making a total of £4,500,000,000 for financial levies. The present annual rate of such levies is estimated at nearly £1,200,000,000, while balances of exports paid for only in blocked marks are increasing at the rate of £500,000,000 a year. Thus the present annual rate of all financial levies is about £1,700,000,000. No allowance has been made in these figures for losses suffered by the U.S.S.R. nor for loot, nor for any destruction to property or injury to persons. It is not possible to give any estimate of these items. In the case of the U.S.S.R. they have certainly been very high, since no direct financial exactions appear to have been levied and the rate of pure loot has been correspondingly higher. I am circulating in the OFFICIAL REPORT a table covering the various countries.

Following is the table:


Conversion Rate—1 Rm. = 1s. 6d.


13⅓ Rm. = £1

(a) Total up to 30/9/43. (Estimated).



Milliard Rm.
Mill. £


France
23·9
1,792·5


Belgium
4·1
307·5


Holland
4·1
307·5


Norway
5·0
375·0


General Government (Poland).
2·1
157·5


Protectorate (Bohemia and Moravia).
1·5
112·5


Serbia
0·7
52·5


Croatia
0·3
22·5


Denmark
1·1
82·5


Total
42·8
3,210·0

Greece 30/6/43 580 md. dr. (No reliable conversion rate is known).

(b) Present annual rate. (Estimated)



Milliard Rm.
Mill. £


France
9·5
712·5


Belgium
1·7
127·5


Holland
1·2
90·0


Norway
1·7
127·5


General Government
0·5
37·5


Protectorate
0·3
22·5


Serbia
0·2
15·0


Croatia
0·15
11·25


Denmark
0·6
45·0


Total
15·85
1,188·75

No estimate can be given for Greece where the German demands vary from month to month and tend to increase steeply.

CLEARING BALANCES.


(a) Total as at 30/9/43.



Milliard Rm.
Mill. £


France
5·0
375·0


Belgium
2·9
217·5


Holland
5·7
427·5


General Government
0·3
22·5


Protectorate
2·9
187·5


Serbia
0·2
15·0


Denmark
0·9
67·5


Total
17·5
1,312·5

(b) Estimated annual rate of increase.



Milliard Rm.
Mill. £


France
2·2
165·0


Belgium
1·3
97·5


Holland
1·9
142·5


General Government
0·1
7·5


Protectorate
0·7
52·5


Serbia
0·1
7·5


Denmark
0·4
30·0


Total
6·7
502·5

The following countries are omitted from the list Norway, because the balance in the clearing is in favour of Germany; Croatia, to which the same probably applies; and Greece, because no recent information is available,

Oral Answers to Questions — BRITISH ARMY

Overseas Troops (Leave)

Mr. Robertson: asked the Secretary of State for War whether he has considered the possibility of instituting a leave service from Italy to the United Kingdom which will allow long service men with the Eighth Army a brief reunion with their families?

Mr. John Dugdale: asked the Secretary of State for War whether arrangements have now been completed by which all men who have served continuously overseas for six years will be sent home by the end of this year?

The Secretary of State for War (Sir James Craig): Such shipping as can be made available for Moving troops for reasons other than operational requirements and sickness is being used to bring back to the home establishment men who have been overseas for many years, and, as I said in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for West Leyton (Mr. Sorensen) on 12th October, I hope that most of those men who have been abroad for six years and more will be brought back to this country by the end of this year. These arrangements rightly have the first call on our shipping resources. A short leave system, which implies bringing a considerable number of men to this country and then sending them back, is at present, I regret, entirely beyond our means.

Mr. Robertson: When we can get large numbers of troops into Italy why should it be so difficult to get small numbers out? And will the right hon. Gentleman consider moving leave troops in small craft to Tunisia and thence by fast ship to a West of England port?

Sir J. Grigg: Every conceivable consideration in the matter has been taken into account and conned over very carefully.

Mr. Bowles: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that convoys which have reached this country in the last three or four weeks have been partly made up of completely empty liners?

Sir J. Grigg: Perhaps the hon. Member will give me particulars. I do not know the movements of every ship.

Mr. Magnay: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, so far as my experience


goes, we, who have numbers of men in the 50th Division, can only get leave for them by application to the War Office? Would it not be far better for the Minister to make some form of quota whereby men could be taken regularly, not because they have written to their Members, but according to length of service?

A.M.G.O.T.

Mr. Driberg: asked the Secretary of State for War if, their other qualifications being satisfactory, Members of Parliament are debarred from serving in A.M.G.O.T.?

Sir J. Grigg: No, Sir. They will be considered on their merits.

Mr. Driberg: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that an hon. and gallant Friend of his was debarred on this ground from joining the staff of A.M.G.O.T.?

Sir J. Grigg: I should be glad if the hon. Member would give me the case to which he refers. To the best of my knowledge he is misinformed.

Mr. Driberg: asked the Secretary of State for War (1) whether it is the function of A.M.G.O.T. to administer recaptured Allied territory, such as Corsica, as well as former enemy territory; and whether officers of French and other nationalities are included in its personnel in appropriate circumstances;
(2) whether it is proposed to change the name or extend the functions of A.M.G.O.T.?

Sir J. Grigg: The initials "A.M.G.O.T." apply only to the Military Government which has been set up in Italy, Sicily, and Sardinia and will not apply to such civil affairs organisations as may have to be set up elsewhere. The operation for the recapture of Corsica was undertaken by French Forces, and the administration of the island is being undertaken by the French National Committee of Liberation.

Wing-Commander Hulbert: asked the Secretary of State for War what qualifications are required of applicants for employment with A.M.G.O.T.; and whether direct commissions are granted to suitable candidates?

Sir J. Grigg: The qualifications of civilian applicants for employment in Civil Affairs, of which A.M.G.O.T. is but a

part, are integrity, administrative or technical experience, linguistic or territorial knowledge and physical fitness which would enable the applicant to undertake employment as a Civil Affairs staff officer under the difficult conditions following an invasion. Direct commissions are granted to a limited number of suitable civilian applicants normally between the ages of 38 and 55, who then undergo a period of Civil Affairs training.

Wing-Commander Hulbert: Can my right hon. Friend say how many commissions have been granted?

Sir J. Grigg: Not without notice.

Headgear (New Types)

Colonel Greenwell: asked the Secretary of State for War whether a design for a new type of headgear has been approved; whether a design, based on the Norwegian skiing cap has been considered in this connection; and if any of the new type have yet been issued to the Army?

Sir J. Grigg: A new beret type cap has been approved which will replace the present field service cap, as soon as stocks of this cap are exhausted, in units not already wearing berets or other special head-dresses. A cap resembling the Norwegian skiing cap has been introduced for troops engaged in, or training for, fighting in snow.

Colonel Greenwell: Is my right hon. Friend aware that numbers of soldiers dislike this very form of cap because it Has no peak to protect their eyes from the dazzling sunlight?

Sir J. Grigg: I imagine that one of the reasons for the two types of headdress which have recently been in vogue is that a cap with a peak cannot be carried in a kit bag.

Major Petherick: Will my right hon. Friend press on with replacement of the service caps as soon as possible, in view of the fact that they are unpractical, extremely ugly and are often worn on the back of the Head and pushing down one ear?

Territorial Decoration (Air Training Corps)

Mr. Hutchinson: asked the Secretary of State for War whether he will amend the regulations governing the award of


the Territorial Decoration so that commissioned service in the R.A.F.V.R. in a unit of the A.T.C. may count for the award of this decoration?

Sir J. Grigg: I am not sure that I understand what are the grounds on which this change is advocated. Perhaps my hon. and learned Friend will write to me saying exactly what he has in mind, and I will look into the matter.

Mr. Hutchinson: Is not the service that these officers give substantially identical with that given by Territorial officers in peace-time, and should not there be some modest recognition of it?

Soldier's Death, Detention Barracks (Inquiry)

Mr. Bellenger: asked the Secretary of State for War what was the result of the court of inquiry held into the circumstances relating to the death of a soldier at Fort Darland detention barracks?

Sir J. Grigg: The proceedings and findings of the military court of inquiry set up as a result of this case have been received, and the findings will be considered in conjunction with the report of the inquiry of which Mr. Justice Oliver was chairman.

Mr. Bellenger: Will the House have an opportunity of becoming acquainted with the Report?

Sir J. Grigg: I am certainly prepared in due course to make a statement to the House on the findings and the action taken.

Mr. Driberg: In that case, could the right hon. Gentleman say what would be the position of hon. Members of this House who gave evidence before that inquiry, since it was held in camera?

Sir J. Grigg: Not without notice.

Overseas Cinema Entertainments

Mr. Evelyn Walkden: asked the Secretary of State for War whether he is aware that a proposed scheme for the taking over of cinema entertainment overseas now under the consideration of his Department is already being partially operated; whether it is in accordance with War Office procedure to put schemes of this kind into operation before final decisions are taken; and whether he will

issue instructions immediately to stop the inauguration of this scheme until the other services concerned have given their decision and until the Entertainments Board specially set up by the Government to deal with such matters and upon which all three fighting services are represented has been convened to consider and report thereon?

Sir J. Grigg: The operation of mobile cinemas has generally been accepted as an Army responsibility and additional Army cinema units have been sent overseas to operate in new theatres of operations. I am not aware that any action has been taken by the Army overseas to take over E.N.S.A. units or to inaugurate a new system. As I said in a reply to my hon. Friend last Tuesday, the future development of cinema entertainment for the Forces overseas is at present under consideration.

Mr. Walkden: While thanking my right hon. Friend for his reply, may I ask whether he would care to examine positive evidence, including cables from North Africa, of action that has been taken either with his approval or with his knowledge; and why is it that he has set aside the Entertainments Board which was set up by the Cabinet to deal with major policy in these matters?

Sir J. Grigg: I have not set aside the Entertainments Board at all. I am prepared to consider any improvements which my hon. Friend can suggest to me, and I will answer the letter of the Chairman of the Entertainments Board, of which he has knowledge, in a very few days.

Oral Answers to Questions — BRITISH PRISONERS OF WAR

Far East

Colonel Arthur Evans: asked the Secretary of State for War whether anything can be done to secure fuller and swifter information regarding the prisoners of war in Japanese hands and the deaths which have occurred in the Japanese prison camps; and the number of men who have died in these camps?

Sir J. Grigg: We have repeatedly pressed the Japanese Government to give us the names of prisoners in their hands and other information regarding them. We shall continue to do so, but as my


hon. and gallant Friend is aware, we must in the last resort depend on the willingness of the Japanese Government to discharge the obligations commonly accepted by civilised nations. They have hitherto shown a lack of disposition to do so. The total number of deaths of United Kingdom prisoners of war reported by the Japanese is 1,232.

Colonel Evans: In view of the high mortality in Japanese prisoner of war camps, will my right hon. Friend consider asking the International Red Cross to see whether it is possible for them to report on the situation?

Sir J. Grigg: That has been done many times, and the Protecting Power is fully aware of our views on the subject. Constant representations and inquiries have been made in Tokio.

Captain Ganunans: Have the Japanese been informed that they will be held personally responsible for this contravention of the Geneva Convention and the ill-treatment of our prisoners of war?

Sir J. Grigg: A general warning has been given over and over again by the Prime Minister, but I am not quite clear whether this specific charge was included in his warning. I will refresh my memory about that.

Mr. Gallacher: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that a number of mothers got an intimation at the beginning of June that their sons were prisoners of war in Japanese hands? They have written the regulation 25 words to the address given, but not on one occasion have they received a line of any kind from the boys who are prisoners.

Sir J. Grigg: I am afraid that is very nearly the universal experience.

Officers' Uniforms and Kit

Mr. Turton: asked the Secretary of State for War what arrangements exist whereby officers who become prisoners of war can have sent out to them articles of uniform and kit which they may have left behind on capture?

Sir J. Grigg: I will, with my hon. Friend's permission, circulate some details of these arrangements in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Following are the details:

The kit of an officer who becomes a prisoner of war is sent to this country for storage, as circumstances permit, after a minimum period of retention of one month in the theatre of war where he was captured. It may be claimed by his personal representative, on the production of evidence that the representative has authority to act for the officer in the matter; if no such authority is held, kit is released to an officer's representative, subject to an undertaking being given to indemnify the Department against any subsequent claims for the kit which may be preferred. Where instructions are received at the War Office direct from the officer, kit is disposed of in accordance with his wishes. Representatives who wish to send to officers, who are prisoners of war, articles of uniform and kit they may have left behind on capture, should address their applications to the Under-Secretary of State, War Office, London, S.W.1.

Mr. Turton: Will my right hon. Friend also circulate information to the next-of-kin of prisoners of war?

Sir J. Grigg: I will certainly consider that.

Repatriation (Royal Air Force Personnel)

Wing-Commander Hulbert: asked the Secretary of State for War how many R.A.F. personnel were included in the recent exchange of wounded prisoners of war?

Sir J. Grigg: Information from the Protecting Power shows that 73 R.A.F. personnel embarked in the repatriation ships.

Oral Answers to Questions — N.A.A.F.I. (CHARGES)

Mr. Turton: asked the Secretary of State for War whether he is aware that N.A.A.F.I. (E.F.I.) in M.E.F. is charging 15 piastres for an enamel mug, whilst a similar mug can be obtained in the R.A.O.C. officers' shops for 5½ piastres; and whether he will take the necessary steps to prevent overcharging by N.A.A.F.I. (E.F.I.)?

Sir J. Grigg: Inquiries are being made into this and into the other specific case details of which have been furnished by my hon. Friend the Member for Abertillery (Mr. Daggar), and I will communicate with my hon. Friends as soon as reports are received.

Oral Answers to Questions — GERMAN PRISONERS OF WAR (POLISH FORCES)

Mr. Shinwell: asked the Secretary of State for War how many German prisoners captured at Tunis have agreed to serve in the Polish Army; whether their offer has been accepted; have the antecedents of these men been investigated; for what purpose these prisoners are being used; and are any of them now stationed in a district of which he has been informed?

Sir J. Grigg: A number of these prisoners, who are Poles, have volunteered to serve in the Polish Forces, but it would not be in the public interest to say how many. They have been accepted after a close examination by the security authorities. Some of them are serving in the district referred to by my hon. Friend.

Mr. Shinwell: Is my right hon. Friend satisfied that this is all square and above board, and that these men will not be used for purposes other than defeating the enemy?

Sir J. Grigg: I have no knowledge to the contrary. I think the arrangements with the Polish Government are made by the Foreign Office.

Mr. Shinwell: As this matter affects general war operations, with which my right hon. Friend is so much concerned, will he keep an eye on it?

Oral Answers to Questions — SCOTLAND

Temporary Housing Accommodation

Mr. McNeil: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has considered the resolution submitted to him by the conference of local authorities in the industrial areas of the West of Scotland, urging the formulation immediately of a programme for the provision of temporary housing accommodation; and whether he is now in a position to make any statement?

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. T. Johnston): I have received the resolution and have agreed, at the request of the Conference, to meet a deputation to discuss its terms. I am meeting the deputation on 29th October.

Hydro-Electricity Board (Chairman)

Mr. McNeil: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland what qualifications for appointment as chairman of the Hydro-Electricity Board are possessed by the Earl of Airlie; and what experience he has had in industry in general and hydroelectricity in particular?

Mr. Johnston: Other members of the Board possess specialist qualifications of the kind referred to in the Question. The Chairman of the Board was invited to serve because of his wide administrative experience, which includes the posts of Chairman of the Scottish Agricultural Wages Board, Chairman of the British Legion in Scotland, and Deputy Regional Commissioner for Civil Defence in Scotland. In these and other posts he has served with conspicuous ability, and, in the opinion of my right hon. and gallant Friend the Minister of Fuel and Power and myself, we were fortunate in securing his services.

Mr. McNeil: May I ask my right hon. Friend whether he has told me that this noble gentleman has no industrial experience at all?

Mr. Johnston: No, Sir, that was not my answer.

Mr. Shinwell: Would my right hon. Friend send this gentleman a copy of "Our Noble Families"?

Mr. Gallacher: In view of the Minister's well known and very low opinion of "our noble families," would he not have done better to choose someone who understood the business?

Mr. Johnston: This gentleman was appointed for his administrative capacity.

Tenant Fanners (Security of Tenure)

Mr. Snadden: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has now considered the question of providing more adequate security of tenure during the war for tenant farmers; and what action he proposes to take in this matter?

Mr. Johnston: The Defence Regulations already provide that all notices to quit must be timeously intimated to the agricultural executive committee for the district so that the committee may be in a position to act in the interests of food production, if necessary by requisitioning.


The Regulations further provide that where land has been sold since 3rd September, 1939, no notice to quit is effective unless the Secretary of State gives his consent in writing. There have been very few complaints reaching the Department of Agriculture of cases which are outwith the protection of the Defence Regulations and the agricultural executive committees, but if the National Farmers' Union is able to collate and submit any evidence justifying further legislative proposals, immediate consideration will be given to it.

Mr. Snadden: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the existing Regulations do not give adequate protection, and is he suggesting that because only a few have been evicted up to date no duty devolves upon him to see that others do not suffer a similar fate? Will he not reconsider this matter?

Mr. Johnston: I have said that I am in touch with the National Farmers' Union in Scotland who have been asked for particulars of any evidence that might justify action.

Mr. Kirkwood: Does the Minister not think the time has now arrived to take the land out of the hands of the landowners and give it over to the State?

National Health Service

Mr. Neil Maclean: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he has now received the Report from the Hetherington Committee on post-war hospital problems; whether he has considered the proposals and is in a position to state if he proposes to introduce legislation to this House at an early date?

Mr. Johnston: The Report was published on 13th October, and as I informed the hon. Member for Greenock (Mr. McNeil) on that date, the Government are considering its recommendations in formulating their proposals for a new National Health Service. It is the Government's intention, in advance of proposing legislation on the subject, to lay a White Paper as a basis of discussion and negotiation.

Mr. Maclean: May I ask when that White Paper is likely to be laid on the Table?

Mr. Johnston: I think at an early date, but I could not pledge myself to an exact date.

Mr. McNeil: Since the problem referred to is rather different in Scotland from what it is in other parts of the United Kingdom, will the right hon. Gentleman see that we have a separate Debate on Scottish health organisation?

Mr. Johnston: That is not a question which I can answer.

Mr. Messer: Is this Report available to the House?

Mr. Johnston: Yes, Sir.

Light Castings Industry

Mr. Maclean: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether in any scheme for industrial reorganisation the claims of the Scottish light-castings industry will be considered, particularly where a change over from cast-iron to alternative methods of production are contemplated?

Mr. Johnston: Yes, Sir. The Scottish Council on Industry have under consideration the position of the Scottish light-castings industry, and I am in close touch in the matter with my right hon. Friends the Minister of Supply and the President of the Board of Trade and with the other Ministers concerned.

Balmacaan Estate

Mr. Maclean: asked the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he can give the names of the various persons or syndicates who at one time or another since Whitsunday 1942 have held the Balmacaan estate?

Mr. Johnston: As the answer is rather long, I propose, with the hon. Member's permission, to circulate the particulars available in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Maclean: What were the reasons for this number of transfers within such a short time, and was there any difference in the prices when this land was being transeferred from one party to another?

Mr. Johnston: The answer to the last part of that Supplementary Question will be found in the figures which will be published in the OFFICIAL REPORT. There is no very obvious agricultural interest observable in these transactions.

Mr. Maclean: As to the so-called agricultural interests, is not this a ramp in land in the Highlands of Scotland?

Following are the particulars:

According to information obtained from the Register of Sasines the trustees of the Dowager Countess of Seafield sold the estates of Balmacaan and Urquhart and Abriachen with entry at Whitsunday 1942, for £88,000 to George Coldham Knight, Estate Agent, of Beechen Grove House, Chorley Wood, Hertfordshire. On 31st August, 1942, the estates were sold by George Coldham Knight for £120,000 to Panton Investments, Ltd., 22, Park Street, London, W.I. They were sold on 7th September, 1942, by Panton Investments, Ltd., for the same sum to Princes Investments, Ltd., 22, Park Street, London, W.I, and on 10th November, 1942, by Princes Investments, Ltd., again for the same sum, to Gillett Stephen and Company, Ltd., Atlas Works, Great Bookham, Surrey. On 6th November, 1942, Princes Investments, Ltd., had agreed to sell a portion of the estate, extending to 540.7 acres, to Montague L. Meyer, Ltd., Melbourne House, Aldwych, London. This portion was transferred to Montague L. Meyer, Ltd., for a sum of £30,300 by a disposition granted by Gillett Stephen and Company, Ltd., and registered in the Register of Sasines on 18th January, 1943.

Oral Answers to Questions — LOCAL AUTHORITIES (POST-WAR PLANS)

Sir Ralph Glyn: asked the Prime Minister, arising out of the Government's policy that no alteration of boundaries of existing local authority areas can be made whilst the Local Elections and Register of Electors (Temporary Provisions) Act, 1939, remains unaltered, how the work of the Minister of Town and Country Planning, the Paymaster General and the Secretary of State for Scotland concerning post-war schemes is to be unified so that local authorities can proceed with plans which must be dependent upon the work of these four Ministries?

The Prime Minister: The temporary suspension of arrangements for the alteration of boundaries does not impede progress in connection with local town and country planning schemes, as any necessary grouping of local authorities can be secured by the formation of joint committees. If for any purpose it is desired to have suggested alterations of boundary considered now in readiness for the time

when the statutory ban can be lifted, my right hon. Friends the Minister of Health and the Secretary of State for Scotland will be prepared to receive representations from the local authorities concerned.

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE (LONG-TERM POLICY)

Major York: asked the Prime Minister what steps His Majesty's Government intend to take in the immediate future to consult with the leaders of the agricultural industry on long-term agricultural policy?

The Prime Minister: I do not desire at the present time to make any statement on this subject.

Major York: Is my right hon Friend aware that last December a statement was made on behalf of His Majesty's Government that these consultations would, it was hoped, take place in the new year?

The Prime Minister: I have nothing to add to the answer which I have just given.

Mr. De la Bère: I am a seeker after truth, and may I ask whether we may know what progress has been made, and when can we expect a pronouncement?

The Prime Minister: I should not be prepared to debate this matter at Question Time.

Oral Answers to Questions — PRE-ENTRY SERVICE CORPS (RECRUITMENT)

Mr. John Dugdale: asked the Prime Minister whether recruiting of boys and girls into pre-entry service corps may now be controlled by the Government in order to prevent unnecessary competition?

The Prime Minister: The activities of these Forces are co-ordinated, and I am not aware of any unwholesome competition for volunteers.

Mr. Dugdale: Is the Prime Minister not aware that further control is desired by a large number of people who are engaged with these Services?

Oral Answers to Questions — WAR DESPATCHES

Mr. Bellenger: asked the Prime Minister how many despatches have


been received during the war from Commanders-in-Chief, Forces serving overseas; and how many have so far been published?

The Prime Minister: The answer to the first part of the Question is 27, and to the last part two.

Mr. Bellenger: Does the Prime Minister recollect that during the last war 15 despatches were received from the Army then on the Western Front and were published within a very short time of their receipt by the Government? Why is this safety curtain dropped between our Commanders in the field and the general public?

The Prime Minister: I think I have fully answered the Question on the Paper.

Oral Answers to Questions — BEVERIDGE REPORT (IMPLEMENTATION)

Mr. Molson: asked the Prime Minister why the Minister without Portfolio now answers Questions regarding the implementation of the Beveridge Report?

The Prime Minister: I am not aware that there has been any change of practice in this matter. I am always prepared to deal with Questions raising major issues of policy, but Questions relating to the Government's work on the Beveridge scheme as a whole as well as to particular parts of it not falling within the province of any existing Department—such as children's allowances—should continue to be addressed to my right hon. and learned Friend the Minister without Portfolio.

Mr. Molson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that on 22nd April last the Minister without Portfolio made it quite plain that he was only dealing with those particular matters which did not fall within the ambit of any particular Department? Would it not be more satisfactory to the House if answers were given by the Minister actually responsible and not by a stooge who talks to a brief?

The Prime Minister: I certainly am not prepared to answer a question couched in such very unseemly terms.

Mr. Shinwell: Might I ask, quite seriously and with no desire to offend at all, why the Minister without Portfolio

answers Questions at all, as he seldom gives any satisfactory replies? Will the Prime Minister consider that we never get any satisfaction from the Minister without Portfolio and that it might be very much better and more appropriate to the circumstances if the Ministers responsible and with authority replied to the Questions?

The Prime Minister: The whole question of how His Majesty's Government should conduct their business is of course entirely under the control of the House, and many opportunities are offered by our cycle of Parliamentary Business when all these matters can be put to Debate, and if necessary to a Division, and His Majesty's Government welcome every desire on the part of the House to bring such matters to a head. I cannot add to this statement at all, in reply either to my hon. Friend or to the other hon. Member.

Mr. Shinwell: Would the Prime Minister appreciate that this is not a desire to be offensive to the Minister without Portfolio but that rather it is a recognition of his inability to deal with these Questions because he has not the requisite authority?

The Prime Minister: I quite accept my hon. Friend's statement that he did not intend to be offensive. I did not think he was.

Oral Answers to Questions — SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH

Rear-Admiral Beamish: asked the Lord President of the Council whether he will invite the War Cabinet Scientific Advisory Committee to consider the general policy to be adopted in planning and financing scientific research in special fields which can be justified in the national interest and for which at present no method of approach or regular provision for support is available through existing official channels?

The Lord President of the Council (Mr. Attlee): I am satisfied that, in general, existing arrangements provide full opportunity for the consideration of any new scheme of scientific research which may further the national interest. In particular, the desirability of extending, where suitable, the fields of inquiry of the Department of Scientific and Industrial


Research and the Medical and Agricultural Research Councils is kept well in mind. Whilst in these circumstances I see no point in asking the Scientific Advisory Committee to undertake a general review of the kind suggested, I should not hesitate to ask the advice of the Committee on such matters if the occasion arose. I am having inquiry made into the three particular instances which my hon. and gallant Friend has brought to my notice, but I may say at once that the importance of these topics has not been overlooked in the past.

Rear-Admiral Beamish: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that his reply will give considerable satisfaction in many useful directions?

Sir H. Williams: Are the Government considering the possibility of establishing in this country anything comparable with the Mellon Foundation in the United States?

Mr. Attlee: I should require notice of that question.

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL FINANCE

Investment Incomes (Taxation)

Sir George Jones: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that during this war investment incomes have tended to fall rather than to rise; and that many owners of investment incomes are entirely dependent on same, having small total incomes and being, through age or other reason, incapable of earning; and, as earned incomes have meanwhile increased and are still increasing, on what grounds he justifies imposing a higher rate of tax on investment than on earned income in such, or any other, cases?

The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir John Anderson): I would refer my hon. Friend to the explanation given to him by my predecessor in reply to a similar Question put by him on 11th December, 1941. I would also remind him that where the taxpayer's age is 65 years or more and his total income does not exceed £500, the same measure of relief as is granted in respect of earned income is allowable, under Section 15 (2) of the Finance Act, 1925, in respect of investment income.

Government Payments by Crossed Cheque

Mr. Woodburn: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that old people, Service men and their dependants are finding great difficulty in cashing crossed cheques issued to them by Government Departments; and whether he is prepared to make arrangements for simpler methods of payment, namely, by money order or open cheque, on verification by identity card?

Sir J. Anderson: As the hon. Member will be aware, recurrent payments to old persons, Service dependants and the like are made weekly through the Post Office, and the payments which he has in mind are doubtless the comparatively few cases made direct by Departments, e.g., gratuities or arrears of pension, allowance, etc. The normal method of payment in such cases is by crossed cheque, but Departments may issue postal drafts or money orders for small amounts. I should not wish generally to abandon the safeguard afforded by the use of crossed cheques, and my inquiries do not suggest any general difficulty in negotiating them, particularly as they may be paid into Post Office Savings Bank accounts. I am, however, very willing to consider steps to meet any cases of special difficulty, and perhaps the hon. Member would be good enough to give me by way of illustration particulars of the cases that have come to his notice.

Mr. Woodburn: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Question refers to cases of elderly people and sometimes to people in poor circumstances who are not acquainted with bankers, and that bankers feel it is very difficult having to refuse to pass the cheques when these people cannot find anyone with a bank account to vouch for them? It is these particular cases I have in mind.

Sir J. Anderson: On the other hand, the safeguard of the crossed cheque should not be abandoned.

Mr. McEntee: Would it not be possible for the cheque to bear a statement that the bearer could cash it at a bank?

Sir J. Anderson: That would be very like uncrossing the cheque.

Mr. McEntee: Could it not be signed like a money order?

Sir J. Anderson: Postal drafts can be used.

Oral Answers to Questions — QUESTION TIME (DISCUSSION OF NEW WRITS)

Mr. Shinwell: May I ask you, Mr. Speaker, whether it is possible to consider some rearrangement of the procedure that is deemed necessary when the Chief Patronage Secretary asks the permission of the House for the issue of a Writ? Today, when my right hon. Friend asked such permission from the House my hon. Friend the Member for Barnstaple (Sir R. Acland) raised the question of whether it was appropriate to do so at this stage because of the state of the register. I do not enter into the merits of that, but as a result of it there was a Debate and a possibility of a Division, and 20 minutes of Question time were lost. I wondered, if I might venture to make a suggestion, whether you, Sir, might consider whether it would be possible for the Chief Patronage Secretary, or any Whip who might represent him on occasion, to move for the issue of a Writ at the end of Question time instead? I think it would be desirable if the matter were reconsidered.

Mr. Speaker: That is not really a matter for me. I am bound by the Standing Orders. If a Writ is moved, then for a quarter of an hour we may debate the matter. When the quarter hour is up the Motion stands over until after Questions or such other time as the Patronage Secretary may choose to move it. Whether it is a matter for considering amending Standing Orders is one for the House and not for me.

Mr. Woodburn: Further to that point, Mr. Speaker. On a previous occasion you were good enough to extend Question time by the amount of time lost owing to the Debate. Would that be possible even to-day?

Mr. Speaker: That was the first time that objection had been taken to moving a Writ. Therefore I did as a special occasion suspend the length of Question time, but I would suggest to the hon. Member that that was not a very good precedent. Perhaps it might make it even easier to spend time on a normally formal Motion.

Mr. Shinwell: May I then ask the Prime Minister, as Leader of the House, to look at this matter, as it appears to be a matter for the Government and for the House?

Will he look at it and perhaps advise the House on some other occasion?

The Prime Minister: I certainly share the general feeling that Question time is one of the most valuable incidents in our Parliamentary routine. I understand that custom and, I believe, the Standing Orders require the Patronage Secretary to move for the issue of a Writ at the moment that he did so. If there was a general wish to reconsider the Standing Order, in order to move these Motions at a different time, say after Questions, the Government would be very ready to consider it, but, of course, it would be at the expense of other Business.

Sir R. Acland: As one of the Members who was responsible for depriving hon. Members of their full Question time—which I immensely regret—may I point out to you, Mr. Speaker, and also to the Prime Minister, that we may reasonably hope that within a very few weeks the occasion for discussing these particular matters in this particular way will no longer be present? Therefore this subject may not require quite so much consideration, as if we had months and months of the present arrangement ahead of us.

The Prime Minister: I am sure there will be very general agreement with those ideas, especially as my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is due almost immediately to take the Floor. It astonishes me all the more that the hon. Member should have thought it necessary, just as everything was going the way he wished, to make this inroad upon our Question time.

Mr. Bellenger: May I put this point to the Prime Minister? Much of the procedure of this House is governed by Standing Orders with which most private Members have very little to do. Is it not possible to arrange, when matters like this do arise, for some expeditious procedure for testing the feelings of the House on a matter which in one case may be only trivial, but on some other occasion may be of much greater importance?

The Prime Minister: As to when the Chief Whip moves the Motion, that is a matter which we might easily discuss and consider, but we must be very careful not to abridge in any way the right of Debate of Members of this House, even when that may cause inconvenience.

Oral Answers to Questions — HOUSE OF COMMONS CHAMBER (CLOCK)

Sir H. Williams: On another minor matter, may I say that it would meet the convenience of the House, Mr. Speaker, if the clock above your head were made accurate?

Mr. Gallacher: Or if the hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) were made accurate?

Orders of the Day — PARLIAMENT (ELECTIONS AND MEETING) BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Herbert Morrison): I beg to move "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
As the House is aware, the purpose of this Bill is to provide an efficient and effective system of registration of electors, despite the difficulties which have been brought about by war-time conditions. I think that proposals made in this Measure will solve those difficulties mid give us perhaps an even more up-to-date register than we had in the period before the war. In view of the introduction of the Bill, opportunity is also being taken to modernise the law as to the direction and conveyance of Parliamentary Writs. On that there is, I think, no controversy. It is simply a matter of tidying up the somewhat chaotic state of the law at the present time.
The modern registration system dates from the Reform Act of 1832, and, as a matter of history, it is interesting to recall that before that Act things were very different. It was the case, I am advised, that the title to vote, if questioned, was actually decided at the poll itself by the returning officer, who often had in attendance a barrister to help him on legal and technical points. All this involved the keeping open of the poll for days and even weeks on end. In the absence of any register of voters, the returning officer in a borough might, for example, have to determine the claim of a person to vote as what was called a "pot-walloper," which was the term applied to one who "cooked his own diet at his own fireplace, in a room of his own." Indeed it appears to have been the case that the only time limit for a poll in those days was the length of the purses of the contending parties and that it was when these resources were at an end, that the poll was brought to an end. History also discloses the somewhat curious fact that as long ago as the reign of Henry VI there was trouble because of the great size of the electorate, for we find in the Preamble to a Statute passed in 1429–8, Hen. VI, Cap. 7—the significant remark that


Elections of Knights of the Shire have now of late been made by a very great outrageous and excessive number of people dwelling within the same counties, of the which most part was of people of small substance and of no value.
Accordingly, that Act of Henry VI confined the right of voting to resident freeholders of land to the value of 40s. a year, which sounds a pretty low qualification now but was probably much more serious in those days. The Reform Act of 1832 got rid of many abuses, but its registration provisions were almost as important as its provisions for getting rid of the rotten boroughs. They put an end to a chaotic state of affairs and established, once and for all, the principle that appearance on the register of electors is a condition precedent to the right to vote. Revising barristers were appointed, but I believe that the only way in which the correctness of the register could then be questioned, was by bringing the matter before a Committee of this House. There was a further Act in 1843, just 100 years ago, which repealed and re-enacted various statutory provisions with considerable amendments, and it is interesting to note that, in particular, the right of the House to decide questions as to the correctness of the register was, in spite of a vigorous protest by Lord John Russell, virtually displaced by making provision for an appeal on that point to the courts of law. After that time, there was virtually no change until the Representation of the People Act, 1918, which is the statutory provision at the present time.
The Representation of the People Act, 1918, was adapted to a relatively static population, a very different state of affairs from that which obtains now, when, owing to voluntary evacuation consequent on enemy bombardment in the early days of the war, the voluntary removal of people to various industrial centres in pursuit of war work, and the compulsory removal of people under directions of the Ministry of Labour, the population has become much more fluid, much more liable to change in its residence, even as far as the civil population is concerned, which is a rather new factor compared with the circumstances during and at the end of the last war. The provision in the Act of 1918 for registration is on the basis that there is a residence qualification of three months, namely, 1st April to 1st

June in each year. There is an officially-conducted canvass by the registration officer, through his staff, after 1st June. The preparation of the electors' lists then proceeds. Publication of the first list takes place on 15th July, and thereafter the publication of the register, as officially and finally approved, takes place on 15th October. We have an annual register, with the consequences that I have indicated.
This system of registration was suspended by the Local Elections and Registration of Electors (Temporary Provisions) Act, 1939, as renewed, and, therefore, the October, 1939, register is still in force in October, 1943. The register is four years out of date, notwithstanding the many population movements—and it is possible that there will be much further movement of the population in the years following the war. It may be some material period after the war before we can say that the population has probably reached a reasonable degree of finality as to residence. In addition to the movements of the civil population, we have the very considerable movements of millions of men and women in the Armed Forces of the Crown, both in this country and in the theatres of war abroad. That brings up another problem which it is desirable should be met, and which this Bill seeks to meet. A further complication is the large demand on man-power in the country, which is organised to a degree beyond anything previously known in our experience, and one of the consequences is that we cannot afford the amount of man-power that would be involved in making the usual annual register, with all the canvassing staff, which this would require, while we should be faced with a considerable printing problem if we had to compile an annual printed register.
It was because of these war-time difficulties that the Government decided to institute an inquiry into the matter, and that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland and I appointed the Departmental Committee on Electoral Machinery. We gave considerable thought to the composition of that Committee. We wanted Parliament to be in it; we wanted the technical people concerned with electoral registration, suitable electoral registration officers, to be in it; we wanted the State Departments, the Home Office and the Scottish Office, to


be in it; and we thought it right that those much-abused people, the principal or national agents of the various political parties, should be in it, because they have great technical knowledge of the problem. We appointed a Departmental Committee which gave fair representation to all these groups, and I think the composition of the Committee was admirable for the purpose. I am exceedingly grateful to them for the work they did. They presented the House and the country with an admirable and valuable Report. As the matter very much concerns movements of population, I thought it fortunate that we were able to get the services of the Registrar-General as Chairman of the Committee, and I am exceedingly grateful for the very valuable work he did. The Departmental Committee made various constructive proposals, and broadly speaking, I think it can be said that the proposals of the Committee are embodied in this Bill.
This is, indeed, a fortunate Departmental Committee. It was appointed not very long ago, it reported not very long ago, and now it sees the substance of its Report embodied in a Bill before Parliament, with every expectation of that Bill soon being passed. If every Committee could see such a rapid consummation of its labours, it would be fortunate. My friend Sidney Webb used to say that throughout English history the average period between the presentation of an agreed Report by a Royal Commission, which had received general popular agreement and was unanimous, and the implementation of that Report was about 20 years. In this case it looks like being about 12 months; and I am delighted to be the leader of such a minor revolution in British constitutional practice. The need for this Bill is considerable, as thugs are with regard to the present register. The Bill not only provides for by-elections but for the possibility of a Parliamentary General Election during the war and in the post-war period.

Mr. McEntee: Can my right hon. Friend tell us the date?

Mr. Morrison: I hope to know as early as possible, and to get ready for it, but I do not know at present. The point about a general election is this: Most of us—there is usually a minority of nine or to Members on the Prolongation of Parliament Bills—are agreed that it would not

be particularly creditable if we were driven to a General Election during the war, and that the issues would be difficult to shape anyway. Nevertheless, it is not right that for administrative, Neal, or practical reasons, it should be virtually not possible to have a General Election. All that balance of power between the House and the Executive cannot properly function without the possibility of a dissolution of Parliament, or if, owing to the state of the law or of practical difficulties about electors, we could not have a General Election, or if we did the electorate would be so unrepresentative that it could not be trusted to show the general mind of the nation. This Bill does not provide that a General Election shall take place. On the contrary, the next Bill which I shall produce will be rather in the other direction. But this Bill does provide that if the House could not live with the Government or if the Government could not live with the House, there would be nothing in the way of organisation to prevent a General Election taking place. I think that constitutionally, this is right.
The other point with which it deals is the making of it possible for by-elections to be contested with an up-to-date register. Quite a number of by-elections have been contested, notwithstanding the much discussed electoral truce between the parties, and in some cases we are bound to agree, the register has been in a shocking state and not creditable to the country. Therefore, we propose to make arrangements whereby the register can be brought up to date. The new scheme embodied in this Bill is based on the 'National Registration system. It was part of our war-time organisation that there should be a National Registration of the population of the country, kept up to date, and that National Registration system has been of the greatest value in arranging food rationing and in various other matters. If we had not had that system, this Bill would hardly have been possible. The system provided in this Bill can last only as long as national registration lasts. There must be preparation, after the Bill becomes an Act, for the new order of things. There is bound to be some delay between the passing of the Bill and its actual operation, but there is provision for me to fix an appointed day. That is provided in the Bill.
The other aspect that will take time is the registration of the members of the Forces, particularly those serving in overseas theatres of war. We took into account whether we should provide that the Bill should not be operative until all the Forces had been registered, or let it march, with the understanding that the Forces will be in a position to vote as and when they are registered and that elections may take place in which some of the Service people associated with a constituency will be able to vote because they have been registered, while others may not be able to do so because they have not been reached. In due course they will all be reached, and we thought it would not be right to hold up the operation of the Bill until all Service personnel had been registered. It will be possible on the appointed day to produce a register for any by-election, and at a later date, when things are easier, we hope it will be possible—indeed, it will have to be possible if there should be a General Election—to produce a register for the whole country simultaneously. Even if an election were to happen during the war, it would be highly inconvenient to have to produce a register all over the country, but we should have to find ways and means. With regard to by-elections, there will be no great difficulty, but it may be that the register will not be printed but will have to be multiplied by duplicating processes of one sort and another.
In the Bill the new register will be in three parts. There will be the civilian residence register. Here the qualification will be two months' residence before the qualifying date. There will be a business premises register, as is provided for under the present law—because in this Bill we are not making changes in the electoral system or the basis of registration of electors; that is a wider and more controversial issue of electoral reform. This Bill is based on the system as it is. The business premises register presents us with a difficulty. There can be no question of wholesale canvassing by the registration officers in order to make a register in the ordinary way, The scheme is based upon National Registration, and as the National Registration machinery is not able to distinguish between business electors and residential electors, it is obvious that the National Register cannot solve that particular problem. Therefore, the Commit-

tee recommended, and the Government have agreed, that in the first stage the obligation must be upon the potential business voter to apply to be registered as a business voter. It will then be for the electoral registration officer to check this up as far as he can and put the applicant on the register or not in accordance with the decision he reaches. There is nothing to prevent the party machine, or at any rate such party machines as are attached to the business voter, entering the lists with a view to the full registration of the business electors. But that has nothing to do with the Bill and has nothing to do with me, not at any rate as Secretary of State for the Home Department. At the second stage there will have to be an annual application, and the registration would then be effective for 12 months. The business electors, like the civilian residential electors, will have the two months' qualifying period.
Thirdly, there is the Service register. On this we have consulted with the Service Departments, and the Ministry of War Transport, in respect of the Mercantile Marine—the seamen—and I am glad to be able to say that we have come to an arrangement whereby the Service Departments and the Ministry of War Transport for the Mercantile Marine will co-operate with a view to securing, subject to any unintended errors, the full registration of Service personnel and seamen. In addition, we propose to register in this Service register civilians who are engaged in war work abroad. We shall provide for all these persons to be registered where they reside or where they would be residing but for their service. Ordinarily there will be proxy voting for men if they are overseas, but if they are in this country, they will have the option either to vote by post or in person. The difficulty with the Services, and indeed with the Mercantile Marine, is bound to be that they are here to-day and gone to-morrow, and no man can be certain whether, when an election takes place, he will be in this country or abroad. We have to be elastic, therefore, and have a system whereby they can vote by proxy, vote as absent voters by post or vote in person, in whatever way is convenient to them, but in such a way that there will be no duplicate voting. The existing law as to absent voters is retained.
I have referred to the qualifying date as to registration, up to which the two months period runs. The qualifying date


is to be the last day in the month before that in which an election is initiated. At that date the records will be frozen. The two months qualifying period will go backwards from that date. At that time, as the House will appreciate, in the case of a by-election, and still more if there were a General Election, an enormous amount of work will have to be done by the registration officers. They will have to bring into register form the material which is available to the National Registration officers. It will have to be typed out or printed, multiplied and so on. The publication of the register, therefore, is not to be expected earlier than 36 days after the initiation of the election. As the register is used for all kinds of purposes, in connection, for example, with the preparation of envelopes, canvassing by candidates and their supporters, and so on, clearly tire election cannot take place on the date on which the register becomes available. There must be a further period. We have gone, therefore, on the basis that the register should be ready 36 days after an election is initiated with a power to extend the 36 days to 42 in exceptional circumstances. The kind of exceptional circumstances we have in mind are those in some of the constituencies in the Highlands of Scotland, or the Western Isles, where, I can imagine, the poor registration officer will be faced with a really serious problem.

Sir Alfred Beit: Can the right hon. Gentleman say the date of the initiation of the election?

Mr. Morrison: I am coming to that. It is an important point. The date of the initiation of the election in the case of a Parliamentary General Election will be the date of the Royal Proclamation. In the case of a by-election it will be the date of the receipt of the Writ. They are definite times, and we thought that that was reasonable.

Colonel Arthur Evans: Do I understand that if the local returning officer receives the Writ from Mr. Speaker he is not required up to 36 days in one case and 42 days in another to make the register available to political agents in the constituencies? If so, is that long enough for political candidates?

Mr. Morrison: That is as a period during which the election or polling may take place. My hon. and gallant Friend

is right. The political machine could not function if that were so, and I agree. We provide, therefore, for the minimum time between the initiation of the election and the actual polling being not 36 days or even 42 days but round about seven and a half weeks, allowing for everything. You must take into account not only the publication of the register and its availability to the candidates and their agents but also the giving of time for the preparation of envelopes and poll cards, if those luxuries can be provided nowadays. They are, however, a great blessing to some electors who almost have to be held by the hand and led into the polling booth to prevent them getting lost. And there is all the usual business of canvassing and the providing of lists at polling stations for the use of the clerks. So a longer period is required and under the Bill the period from the initiation of the election to the date of the poll will be about seven and a half weeks.
A nice point arises here. It is not very nice to contemplate the country without a Parliament for the whole period of seven and a half weeks. It is the custom that when His Majesty makes a Proclamation dissolving Parliament, Parliament is forthwith dissolved, and there is no Parliament until the meeting of the new Parliament, the date for which is also usually provided for in the Royal Proclamation. The interval is usually somewhere about three weeks or a month. There is nothing very shocking in being without a Parliament for that period in the ordinary way. Nevertheless, it would be open to constitutional objection if the country were left without a Parliament for a period not of three or four weeks but of seven and a half weeks. Some matter might arise which required urgent attention, and we propose to deal with that point by providing that the Royal Proclamation shall fix a future date for the dissolution of Parliament not later than the date when the register comes into force. That is to say, although a Proclamation might be issued to-day to dissolve Parliament, there would be a provision in it that Parliament would not actually be dissolved until the date upon which the register to be made came into force. Thereafter there would be about the usual period between the Dissolution and the meeting of the new Parliament. It may be suggested that even that period ought not to exist, that there should be no period in which there is no


Parliament. This is a matter for debate; it is eminently one for Parliament to decide. I am bound to say that my own bias is in favour of there being a clean break of a reasonable period. It is a fine point, but I do not like the idea of one of the candidates being a Member of Parliament throughout the election. It would be a little disadvantageous to the other fellow who cannot put "M.P." after his name.
A second point is that if Parliament exists during the whole election campaign power in the hands of a Government to exercise discrimination as to whether to bring that Parliament together again or not during the election campaign could be dangerous. They might even be able to call Parliament together to decide that there was to be no election after all, and that Parliament was to continue its life. That would be an awkward proposition. It might be accused of being afraid to meet the consequences of an election and extending its own life on this account. This is, I admit, rather imaginative. I shall propose an extension of Parliament later to-day though not for such an ulterior purpose. Nevertheless I do not like the idea. There ought to be a clean cut and no possibility of jiggery-pokery. Even the convening of Parliament for the purpose of a Debate might be of electoral significance one way or another. Taking it broadly, I think we have got on very well with that short break in which there is no Parliament, but it is our duty to see that that short break is not increased or at any rate not materially increased. Therefore, taken in conjunction with Clause 3, Clause 4 (3) (a) provides that when the Proclamation is issued Parliament is not to be dissolved until 36 days thereafter, with the result that there will be a gap in which there is no Parliament of round about 20 days, much the same as at present.
With regard to the machinery of continuous registration, it is clear that there will have to be close co-operation between the National Registration and the electoral registration officers. There are regulations under the National Registration Act, 1939, governing the duties of the National Registration officers, and we can make them do what we require under the Bill. There are to be regulations to be issued under the Bill as regards the work of the

electoral registration officers, and in order that the House may be as fully informed as possible as to our intentions while the Bill is under consideration, I have issued a draft proposed, set of regulations so that the House may have the regulations in front of them at the same time as the Bill. I thought it well not to wait until I got the Act of Parliament and then issue regulations. In order that there should be no question of buying a pig in a poke, I have put all my cards on the table at once and produced the regulations which the Bill gives me power to make, and I think the House will say that this is a piece of good conduct on my part and will give me a certificate of moral virtue and constitutional and Parliamentary integrity. There must be elasticity in that matter, and I think it is inevitable to deal with many matters by regulation. But, even so, constitutional propriety has been fully maintained by the fact that the electoral regulations themselves will not be effective until there has been an affirmative Resolution of Parliament upon them. The rights of the House are thus fully safeguarded in the matter.
As regards expenses, under the existing law the cost of preparing an electoral register was divided, I think equally, between the State and the local authorities, for the reason that part of the register is Parliamentary and part of it is local government. As none of this new register will be for local government, the cost of the registration will be made quite properly out of national funds. There are provisions for slight modifications in the application of the Bill to Scotland, which are to be found in Clause 22, and the question arises as to the applicability of the Bill to Northern Ireland. In the election of Members of the United Kingdom Parliament from Northern Ireland, this Bill will apply. The question whether the provisions of the Bill shall or shall not apply to the election arrangements for the Parliament of Northern Ireland is a matter for the Northern Ireland Parliament and we give them power in the Bill to adopt the Bill, if they so desire.
The Bill provides that the new system can only last as long as the National Registration Act lasts, unless Parliament takes further action about that Act. But we must have provision for a possible interim period, and, consequently, the


last register prepared under the new continuous registration system will remain temporarily in force until the new register comes into force, either under the Representation of the People Act, 1918, or under such new legislation as may be brought along between now and then. We considered that in this Bill we could do nothing about local government elections, for various reasons. We did not think it urgent that there should be local government elections; we thought they would involve a lot of trouble, work and disturbance, and on balance, although none of us has any love for the present system of co-option, we decided that there was not a strong case from that point of view. Another difficulty would be that just as the National Registration people cannot know anything about business and residential electors, so they cannot distinguish between Parliamentary electors based on a qualified residence and local government electors based on other qualifications, including the occupation of unfurnished premises with a minimum rent and so on. The only way to get a local government register would be by a full canvass, and we therefore decided not to deal with the local government franchise. If Parliament decided at any time that the franchise for the local government electorate should be the same as the franchise for the Parliamentary electorate, the question would not arise, but that again brings us into the field of electoral reform, which must await consideration by the members of Mr. Speaker's Conference.
I do not think I need say much about Parliamentary Writs except that the law on the subject is rather chaotic. The law works somehow, probably owing to the ingenuity of the authorities of Parliament and the Law Officers of the Crown. I am not quite sure why it should work, but it does. At any rate, we have decided to tidy it up, and the provisions in this respect are not controversial. They merely tidy up conflicting statutory provisions in many different Statutes dating from 1895. What we have tried to do is to consolidate and modernise them.
I think that the House will agree that the Government have moved with reasonable speed in a matter of considerable complication which has involved a lot of work, both for my Department and for Parliamentary Counsel. It is not my

business to decide who shall win elections but merely to provide machinery which is fair and equitable to all concerned and to hope that the best man or woman will win. I think these proposals are equitable, I think the machinery provided under the Bill will work, and I therefore commend the Measure to the favourable consideration of the House and trust that we shall get it through before the end of the present Session.

Mr. Ammon: I think the whole House owes a debt of gratitude to my right hon. Friend the Minister for the clarity with which he has set forth the proposals of this Bill. I think we ought to join in congratulating him on his minor revolution in being able so quickly to implement the findings of a Departmental Committee. We trust that his example will be noted and followed by other Ministers and Departments in due course. There is very little one can criticise in the broad principles of this Bill. Everybody admits that it is a valuable and necessary improvement on the present situation. There is, however, one matter to which attention might be called, namely, the question not so much of what is in the Bill as of the possibilities that could emerge from it to the disadvantage of the community. At first glance the Bill appears to be a simple war-time Measure, but, as my right hon. Friend indicated in his concluding words, it is a little more than that. It can be carried over into the post-war period.
One regrets that the Minister could not go the whole way regarding reform of the municipal register. I hope that one day there will be no difference whatever between the municipal and national registers. One cannot be unmindful of a situation arising in the country as the war situation improves in which the desire for the brave new world after the war grows less. Indeed, indications are not wanting at the present time that there is a slackening of enthusiasm with regard to such things as the implementation of the Beveridge and Uthwatt Reports, housing, and the like. All this indicates that as we get further from the danger zone there is in some quarters—not in the Government, I hope—the desire that it would be as well if we returned to the status quo instead of looking forward to the new world we all want when hostilities cease.
This Bill would afford an excellent opportunity to raise the smoke screen of a khaki election immediately after the war as a means of ending all our good intentions. I hope that I am unduly suspicious about that and that I am wrong, but the fact is there nevertheless, and I think it just as well that it should be mentioned. Many of us have not forgotten the 1918 election, just prior to which the Representation of the People Act was rushed through. While that election achieved the immediate results of those who engineered it, it had disastrous repercussions a year or two later. I do not suppose the party on this side of the House need fear what might be the result of any election in that respect, but it would be a tragedy if a Bill which is a real improvement so far as registration is concerned should be indirectly the means of bringing upon us even greater disasters than the war itself. It is just because I visualise such a possibility of the Bill being used for such a purpose that I am hoping the mere mention of it will remove any fears of such a practical application later.
Some points will need clarification on the Committee stage. For instance, the Minister did not make it quite clear, although I think it is explicit in the Bill, that there will be no interregnum during which a voter will be without a vote, that he will not be removed from the old register until it is known that he is on the new register.

Mr. H. Morrison: I think that is so.

Mr. Ammon: If that is so, then without any qualification whatever I can offer my congratulations to my right hon. Friend for his timely and workmanlike Measure.

Major Owen: As one who served on the Departmental Committee, I naturally welcome this Bill. It has been my good fortune, or misfortune, to serve on many Departmental Committees during the time I have been a Member of this House, but this is the first occasion I can remember when recommendations have been implemented in a Bill. I gather that I am just about at the right period. I have been in the House of Commons for about 20 years, and here is my first chance of getting on to the Statute Book something which has been recommended by a Committee of which I was a member. On

behalf of the Liberal Party, I welcome this Bill, because it ensures that we shall have an up-to-date register for every Parliamentary election. That is a thing which is of the very greatest importance and significance. The register will be made up, as my right hon. Friend said, in three parts—civilian, business and Service registers. I remember very well what happened in the last war, when the General Election of 1918 took place. I was in the Army in those days, and there was no opportunity for me as a serving soldier to vote in that election. Hundreds of thousands of other Service men at that time were in the same position. I am very glad that provision is made in the Bill which will ensure that Service officers, as well as civilian officers, will see to it that everyone who is entitled, as a British-born subject of the age of 21 and over, shall be on the register.

Mr. Turton: In what way do the provisions of the Bill differ from the Representation of the People Act, 1918?

Major Owen: All I can say is that in the 1918 election Service men were unable to vote in large numbers, but this register will be kept constantly up-to-date, and opportunities will be given to everyone to vote whether at by-elections or whether we have a General Election in the immediate post-war period.
There are one or two small points to which I should like to draw attention. With regard to the business premises register, I think a little more should be done than is provided. The business voter has to apply at the appropriate time to be put on the business register. What steps is he supposed to take to draw the attention of those who are entitled to that vote? It often happens that these things are announced, but as part of another long document. Can any specific method be adopted to advise business electors how to proceed, when to apply and on what grounds they are able to apply? With regard to the order of names on the register, the general custom is that in boroughs the register is made up by streets and in Parliamentary counties in alphabetical order. There is an option in the Bill, if it is inconvenient to arrange the register for boroughs in alphabetical order. There is also an option in Parliamentary counties to have the street order instead of the alphabetical order. I think it would


be a great convenience from the point of view of political agents and the candidate himself if a definite arrangement could be made in counties to have the street order, or perhaps better still the walking order. What I mean is this. The postal authorities in every rural area know exactly in what order to go round the houses and distribute letters. It often happens that in one and the same house there is a family whose members have different surnames. The result is that double work has to be gone through, whereas if you had it in a sort of walking order you could have all the literature pertaining to that household sent in one envelope, and polling cards and everything else, and it would help to avoid a great deal of hard, work.
I should like to have one point cleared up with regard to the second stage. Everyone understands that it is impossible to publish the register during the actual war period, owing to shortage of paper and lack of printing facilities, but in the second stage it is provided that the register shall be published. Is it going to be published annually and emandations made during the year? How often will the emandations be published—half-yearly, quarterly or monthly? New voters will be coming on the list every month. Will the register itself be published annually, or will there just be the one list with periodical additions every year? The right hon. Gentleman said the Bill will only apply so long as the National Registration Act, 1939, is in existence. There was a real feeling on the Committee that the system of continuous registration is of very great value, and I am wondering whether it will not be possible to devise a scheme when the National Registration Act comes to an end to enable the register to be a continuous register in the future. I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on having been so quick off the mark in producing the Bill, and I feel certain that the House and the country as a whole will welcome a Bill of this kind, which enables every individual to have the right to take part in an election at whatever time it comes.

Colonel Arthur Evans: I should like to join the two hon. Members who preceded me, one speaking on behalf of the Labour Party and the other on behalf of the Liberal Party, in welcoming the Measure and congratulat-

ing the right hon. Gentleman and the Government on its timely introduction. The right hon. Gentleman in his very interesting speech traced the history of the matter back to the time of Henry VI. I feel however it would be wise if the House bore in mind that this is strictly a temporary Measure to meet abnormal circumstances, and it is on that condition alone that I welcome its introduction at this time. Of course, the House realises and the country is conscious that this Parliament is about to enter into its ninth year of life and whilst it is true that the character of the Parliament elected in 1935 has little relation to the same Parliament as it is to-day; nearly a third of its Members have changed. Nevertheless the new Members who have come in since the last General Election have been elected on the same register, and no one can possibly contend that the register of 1939 in any constituency in the country is representative of the electors who should have the right to record their vote in 1943.
But I welcome the Measure because of its temporary character, largely because if it were permanent in character, constituents and constituencies throughout the country might be apt to lose their representative and basic character. Large blocks of the population have been shifted from one part of the country to another, and one finds in an agricultural constituency, for instance, as the result of the war, that voters ordinarily resident in that area are outweighed by a large representative body of electors who have been transferred from a strictly industrial area. Therefore, while they might be recording their vote under this Bill in strict accordance with their political convictions and their conscience, nevertheless it might well be that the fundamental interests of the constituency do not find proper representation, so I hope that as soon as may be after the conclusion of the war the Government of the day will introduce a Bill to bring this to an end and put the matter on a permanent basis.
The right hon. Gentleman drew attention to the fact that under these abnormal conditions the country is still liable to be without a Parliament for an approximate of three weeks to a month. He admitted that it was obviously undesirable at this time that the country should be without a Parliament for seven weeks, and that is why he took steps to see that the position under the original Act was


not altered. But I submit that the considerations which must have weighed with the right hon. Gentleman in regard to the period of seven weeks apply equally to a period of three weeks. It is not difficult for any of us to visualise circumstances where it would be essential, even after Parliament had been dissolved, for it to meet in order to give a direction to the Government or a general indication of thought to the people as a whole. Would it be possible for the Government to consider a suggestion, for instance, that instead of Parliament being dissolved, as suggested in the Bill, it would in fact not be dissolved until the date before the poll when the new Parliament would be elected? This would enable the old Parliament to be summoned if abnormal circumstances demanded such a course.
The only objection raised by the right hon. Gentleman was that it might be an unfair advantage for candidates who were Members of the old Parliament who would therefore be at liberty to describe themselves as Members of Parliament during the actual election campaign, but I cannot think it would be impossible to frame regulations which would enable the old Parliament if need were to be summoned up to the actual day the new Parliament was elected and to withhold the right from Members of the old Parliament to describe themselves as Members of Parliament for the purpose of forwarding their own interest during the election campaign. I have in mind not so much a by-election, because such a situation would not arise, but only the abnormal circumstances of an abnormal General Election at an abnormal time. Further, if that possibility was not largely in the mind of His Majesty's Government there would have been little urge to introduce such a Bill at this time. There is, of course, the case of the death of the monarch taking place during a period of that kind, and I think my memory serves me right in such an event it would be necessary to extend the old Parliament by a period of 6 months in spite of the fact that it had been dissolved by Proclamation. If I am correct in that assumption I feel that as this is a temporary Measure designed solely to meet an abnormal situation His Majesty's Government should give the matter some further thought.
Before I sit down, there are one or two minor matters to which I should like to refer. One concerns the registration of Service men, seamen and war workers abroad. Under the Bill a person is entitled to be registered in a Service register if, on the qualifying date, he is a member of the Forces or a seaman or a person registered in the National Register as engaged on war work abroad and has been residing at a place in the constituency or would be so residing but for his service as a member of the Forces or as a seaman or war worker abroad. But no person can be registered in the Service register unless there has been transmitted to the registration officer before the qualifying date a declaration signed by the person qualified as above declaring his qualifications, stating the address where he would be residing but for his service, and giving his service number, if any, and such other particulars of identity as may be prescribed. Further such a person who has made a declaration of this kind may—and these are the words which exercise my mind—"cancel it at any time and, if he so desires, make a declaration to some other place of residence."
I am not quite satisfied that it is not possible for there to be a group of Service men not serving abroad but resident in this country, numbering some hundreds, keenly politically-minded rightly taking an interest in the affairs of the country and the outcome of the by-elections to vote in them all as they occur. They would see that a vacancy had occurred somewhere and that a by-election was pending, and under this Bill they would have a perfect right to apply to the local registration officer to be included among the electors in that division. Shortly afterwards another by-election might occur in some other part of the country and then they could write to the registration officer there and apply to be placed on the register. Is there anything in the Regulations or in the Bill to prevent practice of that kind? I am not suggesting that it would be indulged in upon a large scale, but I am suggesting that there are certain circumstances in which a small number of keenly politically-minded people, ably inspired by certain hon. and talented gentlemen, would exercise a prerogative of that kind unless there is something in the Bill to prevent it.
The second point I wish to mention is that under the abnormal circumstances of the war a large and efficient body of part-time Civil Servants has been built up. I do not mean the ordinary Civil Service, but part-time civil workers such as air-raid wardens, fire-guards and special constables and the like. If I remember correctly, under the original Act servants of the Crown, who normally are full-time employees of the State, are not allowed to canvass electors if they are in uniform. It is obvious that by the valuable service which men and women have rendered to the country in the capacities I have indicated they have gained a unique position of influence in all localities, and I think we ought to take whatever steps are necessary to make it improper for those people to canvass while they are in uniform. It is a matter which would affect all parties in all parts of the country. Having raised these points I should like to say again, as a Conservative Member, how much I welcome this Bill and the opportunity which it will afford to electors, in this abnormal time, to record their votes at a by-election or a General Election and thus ensure that this House remains, as it always has been, thoroughly representative of the people as a whole.

Sir Harold Webbe: I should also like to join in congratulating my right hon. Friend upon finding a solution of a most difficult problem, one, indeed, which appeared almost intractable. If he had been here, I should have liked to add personal congratulations to him on the manner in which he acquitted himself in the unfamiliar rôle of one who takes no interest in the winning or losing of elections. I want to follow the hon. and gallant Member for Carnarvon (Major Owen) in appealing to the Minister to consider once again the arrangements proposed for the creation and maintenance of the business register. Provision for that register is made in Clause 6, which lays upon the individual business man the responsibility of making application for his name to be recorded in the register. It states that the application must be made in the manner prescribed and within the time prescribed under Regulations to be issued. By the courtesy of the Minister we have before us a draft of the Regulations in the form of a White Paper. This particular matter is dealt with in three places in the Regulations. In Section 8

(4) the obligation to make application for registration is repeated. In Section 31 (2) it is laid down that the application must be made to the registration officer by post. In the Second Schedule the prescribed time for carrying out these processes is fixed at to days from the initiation of the election.
Nothing is said, as the hon. and gallant Member pointed out, as to the machinery which is to be used to make it reasonably easy for business people who claim votes in respect of the occupation of business premises to carry through these steps and to make their title effective. I must assume, though nothing is provided, that at least some public notice will be given of the right of the business voter to have his name placed on the business register, but if that notice is to take the form merely of an official notification in the usual place, and an advertisement in the Press, I submit that in these days, when dozens of notices from Government Departments, local authorities, regional authorities and others are being issued, and when it is virtually impossible at town halls and other places to find what is the latest notice, that such type of notice is quite inadequate to give to the business community fair or proper warning that they must take certain steps to gain their right to vote. Furthermore, even when they understand the procedure they have to follow they will be involved in making a purpose journey to some place in the constituency to obtain a form, take that form away and send it to the registration officer by post. The Minister made it very clear that it was neither his intention nor his desire through this Measure to affect in any way the rights which Parliament has conferred upon individual citizens to have a voice in the selection of Parliament, but I submit that the procedure outlined for obtaining the business vote is of such a character as to create an entirely unfair, and I would go so far as to say an improper, discrimination against one section of the community.

Mr. S. O. Davies: Does the hon. Member attempt to justify why the business vote should exist at all?

Sir H. Webbe: I should not attempt to argue that matter on this particular Bill, because I am certain that I should be ruled out of Order. I am not concerned


with the merits of the business vote. It has been granted by Parliament. It is a right given to business people, by virtue of the occupation of business premises, to record a vote in a Parliamentary election, and I am only following the Minister in saying that this particular Bill should not be allowed to alter the rights of any section of the community who take part in An election. I submit that this procedure does discriminate very strongly and very unfairly against this particular section of the community. It is even more obvious when one realises that under this Bill the residential voter is to get his right to vote without even the simple procedure which he is called upon to follow in existing conditions by filling in a form to claim his residential qualifications.

Mr. Mathers: The business voter will surely reside somewhere and have his residential vote, so that the claim which the hon. Member is making that an elector has a right to have a voice in the election of Parliament will still exist by reason of his residential vote.

Sir H. Webbe: I am afraid that if I attempted to answer that interjection, I should be coming very near the edge of being out of Order. I am concerned not only with the right of the business man to vote but with his right to determine in which constituency he will vote, and I repeat that the Minister has disclaimed any desire through this Bill to alter his rights. I suggest, although I am sure these matters have been fully explored, that it is not outside the bounds of administrative possibility that at least potential business voters should, as at present, have a copy of the form of application sent to them by the registration authority. I have been at pains to discuss this matter with registration officers with whom this particular problem always has been and still is a very serious one, and they see no administrative impossibility in what I ask for. It is fair to say that the Departmental Committee themselves, in making their recommendation that the residential vote should be based on the machinery of the National Registration, were influenced not by purely administrative considerations but by the serious difficulties which arise from the present abnormal and extensive movements of the civil population. That particular factor

is not a serious one in the case of a business voter. There is nothing like the same movement of businesses as there has been of private families.
I do therefore beg that this matter be reconsidered and that the Minister will look at it from the angle he himself has put of not desiring to upset in any way the relative rights of the different classes of citizens in the community. I apologise for making rather a lot of this particular Matter, but in the constituency which I have the honour to represent, in the 1939 register, out of a total electorate of 46,000 voters, no fewer than 14,000 had the right to vote in respect of business occupations, and these people were not of course the large industrial and commercial undertakings who have their business premises there. Those people for the main part are limited companies, who have no right to vote. The people of whom I am speaking consist largely of small shopkeepers, small traders and small business men, and I feel it my duty to ask that by the operation of this Bill these particular people, who are such a very large proportion of my constituents, should not be effectively robbed of the right to record their vote wherever they please.

Mr. Cluse: Have not these voters the right to vote wherever they may live?

Sir H. Webbe: I must refuse to be drawn into a discussion as to whether the business vote is right or wrong. I am quite prepared to discuss it at the proper time. Certainly that time, in my submission, is not now.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Charles Williams): So as to be quite clear on this subject, I would say that I have been watching the hon. Member for some time, wondering how far he would go on those lines, and I must tell him that he would not be able to go any further and keep in Order.

Sir H. Webbe: I very gladly bow to your Ruling, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. Interruptions were tending to lead me astray. I wish to base myself on the Minister's statement, and I make an appeal for serious consideration of this matter in justice to the many thousands of small business people who at present have the right to vote in the constituency which I have the honour to represent.

Mr. Pickthorn: I intend to speak for only two or three minutes. I should like to begin by saying that, like everyone else, I welcome the Bill on the whole. I should like to offer some support to the question put by the hon. and gallant Member for South Cardiff (Colonel A. Evans). It seems to me that there is something to be said for his view, though I do not feel strongly about it. I was interested to find a Minister, for almost the first time in my Parliamentary experience, taking the line he did, the line that you could not give the Government the right of reviving Parliament up to any moment short of the moment when the new Parliament has been elected, because, the Home Secretary says, that is far too great a power to trust any Government with. It is very entertaining to find him taking that attitude. Much more often the line taken by Ministers is that we have to assume that Ministers are neither crooks nor imbeciles, and of course they do naturally take that line, and often we have to. On this occasion he did rather take the opposite line. One other incidental point: I wonder whether on the analogy of the statutory woman, the woman who by Statute must be put on this or that Committee—we might not have a statutory Englishman, and arrange that in every Government office there should be one statutory Englishman, whose duty it should be to go through documents and explanatory memoranda and change all the "shalls" into "wills" and all the "wills" into "shalls". We are really getting to the point where our language is entirely losing that rather agreeable distinction.
The particular point on which I should like to address the House and the Front Bench specially—and I am sorry there is no Minister present at the moment—is that, I think entirely by inadvertence in the drafting of this very difficult and technical Bill—I am sure it was inadvertent—the effect of it is, on the best advice I can get, to make it much more difficult for university voters to vote by proxy than for voters in a geographical constituency to vote by proxy. That, I am sure, was not the intention of the Bill. I am sure that everyone, whether he approves or not of university constituencies, will agree that so long as they exist that would be an injustice, and rather a gross injustice, because, for example, my constituency is far younger and far more masculine than

any geographical constituency, and therefore a higher proportion of it likely to be overseas. Therefore there would be a higher proportion of them cut out if their proxy vote were impracticable. I would ask whether I could have an assurance, if necessary by some slight amendment of the Bill, and if that may not be necessary, that then under the Regulations which will be made in pursuance of this Bill, it can be made clear that that was not the intention and shall not be the effect.

Mr. S. O. Davies: I wish to raise one point which I hope will be cleared up before we dispose of this Bill. I with my colleague who spoke from these benches welcome this Bill as far as it has got. My only regret is that it has not got far enough. We might have heard about the need of talking about university votes and business votes, but I cannot enlarge upon that now. I hope that that aspect will come along in the not too distant future. Could we get an explanation on this? A very considerable number of voters from many old industrial constituencies in this country are employed in areas not very far from their home but too far to travel to and from work every day, but most of them return to their home towns or villages, say, every weekend. Where will they be registered for their votes? Not that I am personally alarmed as to the effect of this on my constituency, and, may I say, on the overwhelming Labour vote that exists there, but one can speak best about what one knows, so let me illustrate it by my constituency. I know that numbers of ray people work away from home, but they have their home ties, and they realise that their work is temporary and continues while the emergency lasts, but home ties are sufficiently strong for them to return to their homes practically every week-end. Where will they be expected to register so far as this new register is concerned? [Interruption.] I cannot answer that interjection as to why they should not have the same privileges meted out to them as is meted out to the business man. I am not asking for that, and I am sure I should be ruled out of Order if I did, but this does apply to many thousands of voters in this country, particularly in the old industrialised constituencies, where insufficent work has been provided during the war to absorb


the labour of these people. If provisions are not made within this Bill for those people to vote where they obviously ought to, and desire to, vote—in their own constituency—I hope that will be done. It would be an extraordinarily anomalous position for those people to vote in constituencies where politically they have never taken any interest at all.

Mr. Turton: I am sorry to mar the harmony on this occasion that has come about on the appearance of this Bill to-day. I would like to offer congratulations if I may on the speed of gestation. It has only taken 11 months to get from the Departmental Committee's Report to the Bill. Apart from that, I fear there are certain drawbacks to this Measure with regard to a large number of our people in this country. When it is passed, will it give an accurate presentation of the views of the people of this nation in a by-election or General Election? So far as the civilian voter is concerned, there is a large measure of agreement that it will actively represent what the civilian voters are thinking, but when you come to the Service voter, then a very different result in my view is to be obtained unless this Bill is radically changed in the course of its passage through this House.
Let me start by making certain admissions. Quite clearly it is no easy task to collect votes from men engaged against an enemy. You must not detract them from their main objective of annihilating the enemy by any form of electioneering. In so far as that is a difficulty, it must also surely be a difficulty affecting all voters who are on war service. They should not if possible be distracted by elections and electioneering. For this reason this House has wisely in the past, and will wisely to-day, try to avoid elections so that distraction shall not occur. When we do have an election let us see that the men in the Services get the same opportunity of voting as those engaged on war service.
The other admission I would like to make before dealing with my criticism of this Bill is that it will be said to me that this Bill repeats the provisions of the Representation of the People Act, 1918. I have been given in my hand a weapon for destroying that argument. The hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for

Carnarvon (Major Owen), who spoke earlier and has left the House, sat on the Committee set up by Parliament to inquire into this question and himself admitted that the provisions of the 1918 Act at the end of the last war in what he called the khaki election were a complete failure. It is, I think, a reflection on the hon. and gallant Gentleman who is not now in his place that when sitting on that Committee he did not try to improve it. I think it is a reflection on Parliament now that we have not gone further than the 1918 Act.
Hon. Members will forgive me if I recall to them the history of the 1918 Act. That Measure when it was introduced provoked a storm in the House of Commons which lasted for the greater part of a year—unlike this Bill which, so far, seems to have elicited only two hours of felicitation from hon. Gentlemen. One of the major causes of the storm aroused by the previous Measure was that Members of all parties complained that the existing law did not enable serving men to vote at elections. In the result, the Government, I think on the Report Stage, got some Member to introduce a Clause allowing for proxy voting as an experiment. I have seen the working of proxies in this war and in my view they Nave been a complete failure. If you ask any Service man overseas, "Have you filled in the appointment of a proxy?" I think that in nine cases out of 10 the answer will be, "No." It was my duty at an earlier stage of the war to inquire into this problem, in one of our oversea Commands, and I found there, that it was quite hopeless to work out any plan based on proxy voting, because none of the soldiers engaged in the fighting had made their appointments.
Let me make four requests to the Government regarding Service voting in connection with this Bill. The first is that they should allow the Service voter to vote by post. Since 1918 there have been developments in the means of getting letters home or transmitting one's views to this country. There is the development of the air-mail service, the inauguration of the airgraph and great improvements in the cable service. Will the Government consider using one or all of these methods to allow the Service voter, if he so wishes, to record his vote by post? That is the first half of my first request. If the Government will not


agree to that I put this alternative to them. Will they allow the Service voter to vote in the held? I asked a Question of the Dominions Secretary to-day, as while conscious of the answer, I wished to have it on record. All four Dominions fighting with us in the various theatres of war have allowed voting in the field, It it not a mere business of proxy voting with them. They can record their votes and each man knows that at the election his vote will be counted. What Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South Africa can do, we of the mother country can do. I think it surprising that the House has made no appeal for the adoption by this country of this improvement in the franchise. The proxy is not an efficient substitute. If the House has any doubt about that, let hon. Members go into the Army, the Navy or the Air Force and ask the men who are serving, whether they would rather vote either personally or by post, or whether they would be satisfied with proxy voting. There are many disadvantages in the proxy vote and however carefully you safeguard the system, it is open to abuse. It is also a fact of which some hon. Members may be aware that it is not always the case that one's wife holds the same political views as oneself; and it would be very awkward to appoint another woman as your proxy. I hope the Government will, at a later stage of the proceedings on this Bill, reconsider that matter.
My second request relates to the qualification of the Service voter. According to Clause 8 (1) he has to be
a member of the forces or a seaman
and—these are the words to which I draw attention—he must be
residing at a place in the constituency or would be so residing but for his service as a member of the forces or a seaman.
Perhaps I am a stupid person or one whose brain has been vitiated by war service, but I suggest that this is difficult for the ordinary Service voter to work out, I depends on a hypothesis which, in some cases, would be very dicfficult to follow. Since this Bill was introduced I have had letters from Service men in the Middle East asking for help and guidance in the elucidation of this question. Let me give two concrete instances. Take the regular soldier, with 14 years' service, six years of which have been spent in the Middle East. How can you ask

that man in what constituency he would be residing if, 14 years ago, he had not joined the Forces? Or take the case of a man who joined the Militia in 1939, whose home has been blitzed and whose family has been killed. How can you ask that man in what constituency he would be residing if he had not joined the Forces? There are many men in the Forces overseas to whom this question will present difficulty.
I make two suggestions to the Parliamentary Secretary. One is that instead of this provision the address of the man's next of kin should be taken as his constituency, if he is not residing at that moment in any constituency. That suggestion was rejected in 1918, but I think it is the fairest qualification you can give the soldier. Or, if you like, why not give him a choice and allow him to select a constituency? No doubt if you did that you would have to take measures to prevent abuses by removing the power to cancel it at any time. If you gave that choice perhaps some Ministers might fear that it was a dangerous weapon in the hands of "browned off" warriors but personally, I think we should give great concessions in this matter. As a third alternative, you might provide that the man's qualification should be the place where he last resided in this country. That would be following the precedent of the Australian wartime election legislation.
My third request is this. I do not wish to enter into any wordy controversy with interlocutors on the other side, on the question of the business vote, but if there is to be a business vote why not let Servicemen who are qualified, have it? There are many men in the Forces who joined the Territorial Army in 1939 and who were owners of one-man businesses. They joined up while, perhaps, neighbours owning similar businesses, for various reasons, did not. The one man has now done four years of war service and at the moment has not got his business. The other has been carrying on his business all the time. Is it fair to give a business premises vote to that man and by this Bill to take it away from the man who joined up? I therefore ask the Under-Secretary to consider giving the Service man the right to claim a business premises vote, if he can satisfy the electoral officer that prior to joining


the Service he occupied business premises in the constituency and was qualified to vote in respect of them.
My last request is this. Why is it that we, unlike our Dominions, are not giving the vote of all those who are old enough to fight? It is true that in Clause 8 (2) dealing with the compilation of the Service register, we are allowing all Service men of whatever age to be registered. I hoped when I had read thus far in the Bill that we were recognising the right of all people who place their lives in jeopardy for the country to vote for this Parliament, but I then came to a later Clause—Clause 16—which takes away that right. Will the House bear in mind that the Dominions grant this right of voting to all men, of whatever age, who are serving the Dominion overseas? Surely what the Dominions have done we can also do? If you send a young man from this country to fight overseas, why deprive him of the vote because he is not 21? I ask the Under-Secretary to consider that point also—if a man is old enough to fight and to die, he is surely old enough to vote.
I make no apologies for breaking the harmony of the House by these criticisms. The House has an obligation to these men. The Army and the Navy and the Air Force of to-day are different from the Services as they were in past days. The older generation of Service men took no interest in politics, but politics are a very live issue to the men who are serving in the Forces to-day. Anyone who has seen them in the various theatres of war knows this to be a fact. These men are resolved that mistakes made by all parties in the past are not repeated and have a burning desire to take part in the post-war planning of this country. I hope that in the course of the proceedings on this Bill the House will discharge what I deem to be its duty and give these men the right to record their votes at any wartime Election.

Sir Richard Acland: I concur with a great deal of what the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Mr. Turton) has said and at a later stage I wish to offer one or two comments upon it. Meanwhile, may I make one point to the powers-that-be on the Front Bench? I shall be obliged to ask some questions to which I should be grateful to have a Ministerial answer. "If it is possible, I

should like the Minister to hear those questions, the answers to which will determine the course of conduct to be followed on future occasions. I would, therefore, be happy if it could be arranged for the Minister to reply. But there is no hurry for five minutes or so, and meantime I can pay a tribute to the Minister in his absence without losing anything. Having been, as it were, an agitator on this subject for some months, I would like to say how much I appreciate the steps which the Home Secretary has taken. The Debate so far has certainly been conducted in an atmosphere which is glowing with personal friendship.
A little earlier I took occasion to point out to the Chair and to the Prime Minister that the occasion for controversy over which we sometimes waste time at Question Time, would soon have disappeared. I do not think that the Prime Minister appreciated that I was trying to help the Government—a thing which I do not, perhaps, very often do. The Prime Minister replied, rather sharply, by asking why I was making a fuss when the whole thing was almost over. I would reply to him that decent registers being almost in sight, I do not want to see the electors of one more constituency undergoing the monstrous injustice of having to vote on the registers which we have now. I think that the electors in every single constituency are important, and that their rights should be protected. May I comment on the business vote? I cannot argue my view that there should be no business vote at all; business voters do vote, and we must accept that; but it may strengthen the Government if they should feel that they cannot do very much without taking an awful lot of trouble if I say, in one sentence, why the business men are given this addition privilege, which other members of the community have not got. The reason given is that these men, being business men, have shown that they have a sense of responsibility.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: That matter has already been decided, and we cannot go into the question of why they should not have this vote.

Sir R. Acland: It will be enough for me to say that if these people are not prepared to take the little bit of trouble which this Bill requires them to take, as the Bill now stands, there is grave doubt whether they should have that extra pri-


vilege. I come to the question of the Forces—and here I speak from personal experience in recent by-elections. Even in recent by-elections there has been a theoretical possibility of getting on to the absent voters' register a soldier who is normally resident in the constituency. In cases where we have been fortunate in having a little bit of time, owing to the postponement of the moving of the Writ, it has been found that a soldier living in a house in the constituency is serving perhaps 100 miles away, and if he is sent the appropriate green card, and it is filled up and signed by his commanding officer, he will get a voting paper, which comes by post. I want the Home Office to be aware that this theoretical machinery works very creakily in practice. I am not making a general charge against the Army—how could anyone make a general charge against the Army in days like these? I am not saying that commanding officers and sergeant-majors do not want their men to think for themselves, but I am saying that some men rather wonder whether their commanding officers and sergeant-majors should be encouraged to believe that they are the sort of men who think for themselves. Therefore, if the initiative is left in the hands of the men, nothing much will happen. I want the Under-Secretary to remind the Home Secretary that he is the first Secretary of State, and I would ask him to turn to the Secretaries of State and others responsible for the Services and see that in the carrying out of this thing the initiative is not left with the men, because if it is they will be in many cases frightened of taking it. Do it this way. It is the responsibility of commanding officers of each unit to hold a parade, and to see that each man does the things that are necessary. Make the commanding officer, and not the man, responsible, and then you get it done. Do it the other way, and it may well be that time will be wasted and you will not get your result.
I agree with what the hon. Member for Thirsk and Molton said about the members of the Forces overseas. I will point out what happens now. They are being starved of political knowledge. I get letter after letter from these people, crying out, "Can we learn what is happening in our own country?" The journals which the Army authorities put before them simply do not give the faintest idea of the questions which are exercising the

minds of the citizens in the by-elections—in which, be it marked, the voting is not all or overwhelmingly in the Government's favour. If you want members of the Armed Forces to vote with a sense of responsibility in the next 12 months—and lots of them will have to vote before they get home—it is the bounden duty of the Government—and of the Secretary of State for War, who is the bottleneck—to let the political issues at home get through that bottleneck with the lid off. Let them have a speech from the hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams), expressing his views flat out, with no pulling of the punches. Let all that sort of thing go to the Forces. Do not worry about the danger of confusing their minds. Men out there are thirsting for such information.
I regret that when I come to the really important point of my speech, the Home Secretary is not yet present. I am sure that the Under-Secretary, in consultation with his right hon. Friend, will give me the best answer he can. I may say, quite frankly, that what depends on it is whether I and my friends are going to do as much as we can, to raise as much trouble as we can, on the moving of every by-election Writ, for as many months as may be. I want to get the right answer, so that I shall not do the wrong thing.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Peake): It depends what the right answer is.

Sir R. Acland: When is the appointed day going to be? That is the real question. From an appointed day we shall start getting by-elections on this new register, which will not be perfect at first, but which will be better. I recognise the difficult fact that you will not get the Forces register right for months; but the Home Secretary himself has said that, faced with this issue of waiting until the Forces register is ready, or alternatively bringing the Bill into operation and getting the civilian register right, and doing the best he can with the Forces, he has chosen the second alternative. Therefore, in what I am going to put now no possible question about the Forces register can arise. It is hoped that the Government will do their best, and will achieve success as soon as possible, but no question of delay in achieving complete success can be justification for delaying anything else. I want to know precisely what, in


relation to the civilian register, prevents the appointed day from being one day after this Bill became law, at any rate so far as by-elections are concerned? I hope that the Government will believe that I entirely understand the difficulties in relation to a General Election, because in a General Election you would have to put 615 registers in order, and this would have to be done by a local man on the spot. The Home Office experts would not be able to attend to each constituency. I can quite understand if the Government say, "We cannot do this in relation to a General Election until we have had a couple of months to train local people in the work they are going to do, and we cannot have any mistakes, because mistakes would be serious." But that would not apply to by-elections. For by-elections it is quite possible to spare the services of one or two, or five or 10, Home Office experts, to make sure that the local officials understand the job that they have to do, and do it properly.
I understand that this job, once it begins, is done on the basis of certain raw material, and that it takes a certain time, estimated at 7½ weeks. I am not talking about anything which is to happen within those 7½ weeks. I understand—and here I would like to be corrected if I am wrong—that all the raw material on which this 7½ weeks would begin is available, or almost completely available, in almost every constituency, that the information in the possession of the National Registration officers is to-day sufficient, or almost sufficient, for the seven and a half weeks' work to begin. What about the words, "almost sufficient"? Let us in the next few by-elections which may happen extend that 7½ weeks to 9½ weeks, by tipping the wink to the party Whips concerned that they must not move Writs for a fortnight after the vacancy becomes known. If that fortnight has to be stretched to three or four weeks so be it. If the Home Secretary tells me that this information on which work will start is nearly but not quite complete, that it takes three or four months to get it complete over the whole country, I quite understand. But what is the work which has to be done between the situation as it is now and the situation as it needs to be in order for the 7½ weeks' work to start in each constituency in which a by-election occurs, which can

prevent the operation of this Bill, subject to what I said about moving the Writs at the appropriate time, from the date on which the Bill is passed?
If I can have a straight answer to the question of whether the precise difficulty can be clearly described by the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary, I shall be happy. If he cannot show us the difficulties in each isolated constituency which cannot be surmounted by the concentrated wisdom of the Home Secretary and of his whole Department, at the cost of perhaps adding about four weeks' work to the seven and a half weeks already stipulated, plus the expense perhaps of having to switch into that particular constituency half-a-dozen Home Office experts who really know all the ropes and will get the local officials to see that they do it in the right way, I shall not be happy about it. If he cannot, I shall be profoundly disturbed, because the Deputy Prime Minister, when asked a little while ago to-day why the Writ should not be postponed for an extra week or so when the particular constituency could be given the right to vote on a definite register instead of a rotten register, implied that there would have to be four weeks' work done not in general but in West Woolwich before the electors could be given a decent register.
As at present informed, I do not understand that position. If I am otherwise informed and am given a proper answer, I will receive it with great pleasure. If not, it would appear to me that the Deputy Prime Minister was in one way or another giving the House an impression which was not in accordance with the true situation. I do not put it higher than that. We cannot expect such men as the Deputy Prime Minister to be au fait with every little aspect of every matter. Why he was putting up that particular aspect, I do not know, but he was accusing me of being careless in the bargain. I want an answer. Unless we are shown how it is impossible, with an extra four weeks' work or so, to give each constituency a distinct register as from the passage of this Bill, then all the Writs that come before the House are going to be debated and, subject to Mr. Speaker's discretion, voted upon, and the Debate may not be brief, either. This has become an intolerable situation. I thank the Government, the Home Secretary and the Committee responsible for having recognised that it is intolerable, and I am glad that


they are moving towards it with very considerable dispatch. This distorted view of the case of by-elections cannot be substantiated unless it is shown that it cannot be done in that way, and I hope that the Government will give the real answer or will say that the appointed day shall be the day after.

Mr. Gallacher: I want to say a few words in support of the proposition that the lads and lassies should get votes at 18 years of age. I cannot understand how the Home Secretary can, at a time like this, come forward with a Bill and avoid that very obvious implication of all the promises that have been made since the lads were called up. The lads and lassies are conscripted at 18 years of age in order to defend this country and in many cases to defend the property of Members opposite. The most lavish promises have been made in the course of the many appeals that have been sent out to these lads and lassies serving in the Forces. It is becoming obvious from the speeches we have heard recently that the promises are being discarded and that there is a tendency on the part of Members opposite to hold on to what they have and to pinch a little more if there is any chance of pinching. They are not going to give up anything that they possess, and if you suggest it the Prime Minister is presented before us to tell us that it is controversial and that we must not have anything that is controversial during the period of the National Government.
Here is a question that will determine whether the promises given have any meaning or not. Surely the lads and lassies who have been conscripted and used for all kinds of offensive and defensive action should be given the right to vote and to have a say in what is going to happen once the fighting is over. There are many of these lads who were called up at 18 and sent abroad at 19 who will not have the opportunity of voting; they are lying on some foreign battlefield; but those who come back should surely have the right to have a say in the future of this country. Come with me and see some of these lads of 18 and 19 years of age marching along the street. What a splendid demonstration they give of youth, keenness and enthusiasm and of a desire to live and progress. What a contrast it

is to the dreary demonstration of mental paralysis we see on the part of Members opposite. They have the vote, and they have not only the right to vote but the right to talk for the voters. The Home Secretary should look behind him, and he will see those who have no concern for anything but their own personal property and prestige and power; they have no concern for the masses of the people. They have the vote and through the use of all kinds of political devices and trickery, the right to speak for those they do not represent. If the Home Secretary would consider that, he would not hesitate to give these lads and lassies the opportunity to vote.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Milner): The hon. Member appears to be travelling beyond the terms of the Bill and is discussing a change in it which is out of Order. The question of a new electoral qualification is not within the Bill.

Mr. Gallacher: I am sorry, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, if you have that impression of what I said. It is to those on the other side that I am referring. There is a continuous appeal being made to young men in the mines to work harder than they have ever worked before. There is not a Member in this House who at one time or another has not made an appeal to them to work harder and produce all the coal that is necessary for the life of this country.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: If the hon. Member continues to proceed on those lines, I must ask him to resume his seat. He is quite outside the Bill.

Mr. Gallacher: I am discussing the Second Reading of the Bill and suggesting that the youth of the country should be brought into the Bill, and there will be Amendments coming in for the Committee stage of the Bill on this particular question. The other day the Secretary of State for Home Affairs, who at one time claimed to be a Socialist—I do not know whether he still adheres to that claim or not—stood at that Box and made a very strong case for a certain personage at 18 years of age occupying a very important position on what is called the Regency Council.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I am afraid I must ask the hon. Member to resume his seat.

Mr. Gallacher: Mr. Deputy-Speaker—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: If the hon. Member proposes to proceed on these lines, I cannot allow him to do so, but if he wishes to proceed on lines that come within the four corners of the Bill, he may do so.

Mr. Gallacher: I am in full support of the proposition already put before the House that the lads and lassies of this country should be given the vote at 18 years of age.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Mr. Guy.

Mr. Gallacher: On a point of Order. An hon. Member opposite raised and discussed the question of the giving of the vote at 18 years of age, and I want to understand what is wrong in my following that up and why on the Second Reading of the Bill one cannot give reasons why the Bill should be changed in order to bring in lads and lassies of 18.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Those separate points are irrelevant to this particular Bill, which deals with certain machinery. The matter of qualifications comes under another heading altogether. We are dealing with the existing franchise.

Mr. Gallacher: This is a Bill dealing with machinery that is going to decide the voting now and. when the war is ended, and it will determine whether or not the lads who are serving in the Army shall get the vote or not.

Mr. Turton: Mr. Deputy-Speaker, may I draw your attention to Clause 16 (Right of person registered to vote)? Surely, with great respect, if you confined your argument to a deletion of the proviso to Clause 16 it would not' be out of Order?

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: That may or may not be so, but the question of new qualifications is certainly not within the purview of this Bill.

Mr. Guy: I desire to draw attention to the position of a certain section of the community who, I am sure all of us are well aware, have rendered excellent service to the country during this war. I refer to the nursing profession. The Bill seems to cater very well for the members of the Armed Forces, the Merchant Service and war workers, but I fail to see, unless they are covered under the civil population, that there is a safeguard for the nursing profession to register their

vote. I ask the Minister to say where the members of the nursing profession come in. I have received a letter from a nurse who is very keen about this business and very anxious to be assured that her position is to be safeguarded and that she will be able to register her vote at election times. I hope the Minister will give us an assurance that the nursing profession will be safeguarded. I should imagine that they will be able to register at the hospitals at which they are resident, but many are transferred within a few months to other hospitals, and I would like to know whether they are to carry with them the right to be included in the two months' provision.

Captain Duncan: I came to this House to-day not with the intention of speaking but with the expectation of listening to a Debate of some length on the subject of this Bill by the civilian Members of the House, not only on its civilian details but on its Service aspects. I rise now only because the Debate has taken such a short time and because I do not think the Services side has been adequately put. I can speak only from experience in the Army and not for arrangements made by the Air Council or the Admiralty, but I feel that the arrangements made in respect of the Service voter are not adequate. I want to support what my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Mr. Turton) said in requesting the Government to answer specific questions. He raised the question of proxy for Service voters, and I, too, would like the Government to reconsider this matter. Unfortunately, my experience in the Army has so far only been at home, but the same principle applies to overseas Service voters. Soldiers, when they join the Army, although they take an interest in citizenship and national politics and read the papers which they can get at home and which they are getting in increasing quantities—

Sir R. Acland: But what is in the newspapers?

Captain Duncan: —are not so interested in politicians as to wish to vote for a particular candidate when he comes forward at the request of the Government, the request of the leader of a particular party or even at the request of the candidate himself. Secondly, I would like to raise the question of the business vote.


First of all, in regard to the civilian, I see on page six of this Bill that no civilian can be registered as a business premises voter unless he makes an application. Surely there must be sufficient information in the hands of the food and local government authorities, if in no others, to enable a fairly accurate estimate to be made of all business premises voters. This matter does not affect only the owner-occupier of the business premises; it affects also the wife or husband as the case may be. I would like to see that proviso taken out, so that local registration officers can accept business premises voters without application having to be made. As regards the Service voter, I cannot for the life of me see why a Service voter who was in business before he joined up cannot remain entitled to his business premises vote. Again, if he is not entitled to it, the wife or husband, as the case may be, is not entitled to it either. You cannot register the wife of the business premises voter unless the business premises voter himself is registered. So you are depriving the Service man or woman of his or her business vote.
Finally, I would like to say that the Army is not like it was in the last war. It is far more intelligent and more interested in these things, and its intelligence is being directed towards these things. I was reading to-day—I hope it is not secret—an Army Council Instruction, just issued, stating that three periods a week are to be allotted to various studies on citizenship. That is an indication of the interest that is being taken by the authorities at home. The Army is not only a first-class Fighting Force, it is an intelligent Force and should be given every opportunity to show that intelligence at the poll as and when the occasion arises.

Mr. Gallacher: On a point of Order. In Clause 8, which deals with members of the Forces, seamen and war-workers abroad, paragraph 2, Sub-section (b) states:
Whether the declarant had, on the date of the declaration, attained the age of twenty-one years ….
I want to ask you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, whether it is permissible to discuss that and whether it is permissible on the Committee stage to put down an Amendment which would alter it to:
.… attained the age of eighteen years…

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I should have to see the exact terms of the Amendment before giving a Ruling.

Mr. Gallacher: Is it permissible to discuss the question of age?

Sir A. Beit: Further to that point of Order. Is not this Clause and most of the Bill based on the Representation of the People Act, so that no Amendments could be introduced which would conflict with that Act?

Mr. Gallacher: Do not help Mr. Deputy-Speaker; he can help himself.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: It is not, of course, in Order to discuss Committee points on Second Reading.

Mr. Evelyn Walkden: I want to raise one item which is, I think, of considerable importance and concerns something which is not in the Bill rather than what is in the Bill. We are setting up machinery which will enable us to compile a register; we are preparing means of enabling the average citizen and Service man to have a vote. I confess that I am disappointed that the Home Secretary, his advisers or the Government have not looked at what happened during the khaki election at the end of the last war and the possibilities after this war. I refer to the machinery which will enable Service men to make use of these facilities should Dissolution take place before those who are entitled to vote are brought home. As one of those who served abroad after the last war, I remember that we received literature weeks and months after the election had taken place. We did not get literature from the candidates we would have liked to have supported, because they expressed the point of view of the already disappointed soldiers at that time. If I were a soldier now, I should be discouraged unless I had the assurance that when Dissolution takes place, assuming there is a General Election immediately following the cessation of hostilities—and there will be—every man in the Armed Forces will know that he has the fullest possible facilities for registering his vote and having it counted. I know that a long time ago my vote in the Ince division of Lancashire, following which a very old family friend was returned as Member of this House for many years, was not counted in his favour. The facilities then were insufficient, and I am


still afraid that the facilities now provided Will be insufficient to give the necessary assurance to our men in the Fighting Services that they will be able to study the qualifications of the candidates, their manifestoes and to record their votes and have them counted. I would like to have the assurance that this Bill will mean all that we intend it to mean in the light of what I have said.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Peake): I am sure that my right hon. Friend has every reason to be gratified by the reception this Bill has received. It has, I think, been generally welcomed. I would like to refer to a few points which have been mentioned in the course of the Debate, and although some of them are points more properly of a Committee character I think that if I refer to them now it will contribute towards saving time and expedite the Committee stage. My hon. Friend the Member for North Camberwell (Mr. Ammon asked whether there would be an interregnum between the coming into force of the continuous register under this Bill and the termination of the existing register based on the year 1939. I can assure him that there will be no interregnum and that on the appointed day when the new registration comes into operation that will be the time when the 1939 register ceases to operate.
My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Carnarvon (Major Owen) and my hon. Friend the Member for the Abbey Division of Westminster (Sir H. Webbe), who are not in their places at the moment, raised the question of the business voter. It is perfectly clear that a system of registration based on national registration machinery is incompatible with a canvass by electoral registration officers in order to ascertain who are and who are not qualified as business voters. The whole purpose of the Bill is to avoid a canvass of that sort which would entail an enormous amount of labour, and the question therefore as far as the business premises rota is concerned, boils down to whether it is possible to give sufficient publicity to enable an application to be made for an entry in the business register. All necessary steps will be taken to ensure publicity in the matter, and the forms upon which the application is to be made will be made available to the agents of the political

parties in the constituencies so that they can act independently of any publicity and get in touch with persons who may be qualified as business persons.
The hon. and gallant Member for Carnarvon made a suggestion about the arrangements of the order of names in the county register that will certainly be looked at to see if it is feasible. He also asked how often the register would be published in the second stage. All I can say at present is that it will be printed when the second stage is reached and that amendments to it will be published month by month. The hon. and gallant Gentleman hoped that this continuous registration system might continue even after the expiration of the National Register.
On the other hand, my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for South Cardiff (Colonel A. Evans) said that what he liked about the Bill was its temporary character. I think that we shall have to see what our experience is when it comes into operation. It is clear that one if not two General Elections will be held under the system provided by the Bill, and we shall then be in a much better position to appreciate on the one hand the advantages of this system and on the other certain drawbacks which it has in comparison with the old system established by the Representation of the People Act, 1918.
Two hon. Members raised the question that a man on the Service register might declare under Clause 8 (3) for a change of residence and thereby secure a vote in a constituency where a by-election was pending. My hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Mr. Turton) went even further and suggested that a Serviceman might be given almost free option of constituency. I think that might have somewhat unfortunate results, not of course for my hon. Friend, whose long and gallant service in the Middle East would no doubt be rewarded by the receipt of the vote not only of his battalion but perhaps of his brigade or division—votes of which he is in no need whatever—while on the other hand an unpopular Minister or one who had done something that caused discontent in the Forces might be displaced by the whole of an army corps deciding to cast their votes against him. While I appreciate my hon. Friend's suggestion for improvement in Clause 8—and we will look at them carefully—I do not think that that particular


suggestion is one that is likely to commend itself certainly to the Government if not to the House.

Mr. Turton: I pointed out that some Ministers might be frightened as the result of my suggestion and therefore I made an alternative suggestion.

Mr. Peake: I can assure my hon. Friend that his forecast is perfectly correct.
The hon. Member for Cambridge University (Mr. Pickthorn) had a point about the university vote. Certainly it is not in our minds that anything should be done in this Bill to make it more difficult for a university voter to record his vote, and if my hon. Friend can show us that there is something that has that effect, we will take it carefully into consideration. The hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton, who has evidently taken a great interest in the Bill, first of all said that in his view a Service voter should vote by post and not by proxy. What the Government have in mind is that members of the Forces should be given effective opportunities of exercising their right to vote, and if anyone can suggest better methods than those laid down in the Bill, they will be considered. At the same time I must make it clear that a Service voter if in this country can vote either in person or by post or by proxy. It is when the Service voter is overseas that the method of proxy is prescribed by the Bill. If we could make it certain that the Service voter would have a better or as good an opportunity of recording their vote by post when abroad there would be no objection to doing it. But under the Bill the register is published on the 36th day after the initiation of the election, and the election takes place 17 days later. From many parts of the world in which our Forces are serving it would therefore be quite out of the question that a postal communication could be received with any degree of certainty before the polling day, and it would not be the wish of anyone that the declaration of election results should be held up for weeks in order that votes from overseas sent by post might be received. I think there is a great difficulty about voting by post by overseas voters, and I am inclined to think, subject to anything my hon. Friend may say, that voting by proxy is the most effective means we can provide for members of His Majesty's Forces serving overseas.
My hon. Friend also asked whether a Service voter could not also have a business vote. There is nothing in the Bill that prohibits a Service voter having a business premises vote if he is qualified, but there are practical difficulties about the business voter in the Services overseas establishing his claim, and I do not see how they can be overcome. I do not think we could adopt my hon. Friend's suggestion of saying that a man who had at some time in the past been qualified as a business voter should therefore be considered as so entitled in the future. After all, many men and women who have been at some time in the past been qualified as ness premises vote would have ceased in the ordinary course of events to be qualified at present, and I hardly think it would be reasonable to accord the business premises vote simply because at some time the qualification had been held.

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: Could not the wife of a soldier who formerly held a business vote claim it in the absence of her husband overseas?

Mr. Peake: That is a difficult point, and I should like to look into it.

Captain Duncan: Will my right hon. Friend have another look at Clause 8 (7)?

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: Would it not be possible for the previous holding of a business vote to be held to be an application for a renewal of the holding, subject to confirmation by the registration officer that the business is still there?

Mr. Peake: We will certainly look into that, but it is a very difficult and complex matter. In answer to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for North Kensington (Captain Duncan), all the Sub-section says is that a person registered in the Service register shall be deemed to be registered in respect of a residence qualification. That does not mean that he cannot have a business vote as well. He may have two qualifications at the same time in two different constituencies.
My hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton raised a point with regard to the age at which the vote should be exercised. The question of age of course lies outside the scope of the Bill, which is only concerned with the compilation of a register.

Mr. Bowles: I understand that after the last war, in November and December, 1918, many men were left in Palestine, and they got the names of A, B and C, the candidates standing in their constituency, but no indication which party they represented. I was wondering if it was possible to think Out some method by which serving officers and men abroad would know whether to vote for Morrison, Peake or Webbe.

Mr. Peake: We are providing in the Bill for the Service man overseas to vote by proxy. He will not therefore indicate for whom he wants to vote but he will say to his next-of-kin, or his wife or his sweetheart, "When an election comes along cast your vote as you think I should have liked to cast it on my behalf."

Major Owen: A soldier may, if he is within reach of the Bill, vote in person. The name of the proxy is then crossed off, and he is not allowed to vote in respect of that man. In the case of a civilian, the same thing does not apply. According to Schedule 2, if a civilian has a proxy he is committing an offence if he votes otherwise than by proxy and he is liable to penalties. Why should there be any differentiation between the Service man and the civilian in that respect?

Mr. Peake: I will look into that point. The hon. Baronet the Member for Barnstaple (Sir R. Acland) breathed fire and brimstone upon the Treasury Bench and said that, if he did not get the right answer to his question, there would be serious trouble for the Government. All I can say is that in that respect His Majesty's Government is like the badger, which is a very naughty animal and, when it is attacked, defends itself; and if the hon. Member opens his campaign, we shall just have to see what means we have at our disposal to meet it. What concerned the hon. Member was how soon the appointed day under the Bill would come, because until then elections must be held on the 1939 register. He suggested that that period should be reduced to practically nothing, that the appointed day could be brought into operation immediately on the passage of this Bill. That is clearly impossible. A great deal of work has to be done after the passage of the Bill in order to enable the new continuous register to be built up.
Let it be observed that the new system of qualification is based upon residence for a two months' period. Immediately this Bill is passed National Registration officers will start passing to the electoral registration officers lists of names, and so forth, of persons who are resident in different constituencies. When the electoral registration officers receive this material they will have to sort it out and arrange it either by streets or, in some country districts, in alphabetical order. The hon. Member suggested a further alternative, arranging the names, in the county districts, in the order in which the postman circulates in a district. All this will give a great deal of work, and we estimate that in the slowest constituencies the period during which the electoral registration officer is arranging his material may be as long as eight weeks. In smaller constituencies it may be less, but we take eight weeks as the maximum period for this initial operation. In some constituencies it may be a month, in others six weeks, and in others the maximum of eight weeks.
At the end of that stage the electoral registration officer will have, we hope, a complete list of persons resident in the constituency, but he will not have any means of knowing whether these people have resided in the constituency for a period of two months. Therefore, it is only two months later that a register can be constructed. Some of the people on these initial lists will have come on to the list through only a day or two's residence, and it is clearly impossible, without altering the whole scheme of the Bill, which provides for two months' residence as the basis of qualification, to shorten the period of four months between the passage of the Bill and the appointed day by more than a week or two.

Sir R. Acland: I am completely mystified. I am sorry if I am stupid. It appears to me that when this machinery begins to work, within six weeks or so a register will be put into the hands of the returning officer, and that the returning officer will then have to wait another two months to see whether everybody has been there for two months. I understand the work has to be done in 7½ or eight weeks but what I do not understand is this: Assuming that, by a miracle, this Bill was passed and received the Royal Assent to-morrow, why should not the work of that 7½-week period begin in Woolwich


on the next day? What is the work which we now require to do upon the information which is at the moment available in order that, if the Bill were passed tomorrow, the proper authorities might not begin their seven or eight weeks' work at Woolwich by the end of this week? As that would be the first shot, the Government might perhaps oblige in that instance by extending the period from 7½ to 9½ weeks.

Mr. Peake: If I understand the hon. Member aright, he is satisfied that some period will be required for the transfer of the material to the electoral authorities.

Sir R. Acland: But all this within the 7½ weeks.

Mr. Peake: No. The 7½ weeks begin to run from the date when the register is frozen. It is quite a separate thing altogether. In order to compile the initial register, there has to be a period which will average six or seven weeks for the sorting and the arranging of the material. For the sake of greater accuracy I will read a passage from my notes:
It will not, however, be practicable for the electoral registration officer, from the material supplied him during the first period, to ascertain when the qualifications of the persons included in that material will mature. But having got a complete record on the last day of the first period of the persons resident in the constituency on that day, the electoral registration officer will know that each of these persons who is still there two months later will be qualified to be registered.
I think that is fairly clear to the House as a whole, though I am afraid it will not in any event satisfy my hon. Friend the Member for Barnstaple, and therefore we are quite prepared for the campaign upon which he will, no doubt, embark in due course.
The hon. Member for South Poplar (Mr. Guy) mentioned the nursing profession, and I think his point was that they were not qualified for inclusion in the Service register. I should like to look into that point. We certainly do not want to put the nursing profession at any disadvantage in exercising their votes, and we will look at the point between now and the Committee Stage. I thank the House for listening to my observations with such patience and thank them for the welcome they have given to the Bill.

Mr. E. Walkden: Will the right hon. Gentleman give as a straight answer to the question of the absent voter in the Services who is serving East of Suez? If there is a dissolution of Parliament there will be 1,000,000 people East of Suez, who, unless they have indicated that they wish to be on the voting register, will be disfranchised, and the right hon. Gentleman knows it.

Mr. Peake: I do not think my hon. Friend has studied the provisions of the Bill carefully. What is intended as regards the Service voter is that immediately the Bill is law facilities shall be given in the Services abroad for the completion of registration forms and proxy forms appointing proxies, so that the soldier can take part in any election which takes place at a future date. Under Clause 10 arrangements will be made for securing that every person appearing to be qualified to make a Service declaration shall have an effective opportunity of exercising the rights conferred upon him by this Measure. That is not merely a pious wish; there is a mandatory instruction to the Service authorities that they shall make it practicable and easy for every man in the Services to appoint a proxy to vote on his behalf.

Mr. Montague: If a citizen in this country serving in the Far East has appointed a proxy, is the proxy bound to accept that proxy?

Mr. Peake: Nobody can be compelled to exercise the light to vote, but if my hon. Friend is appointed a proxy by a friend of his serving in the Middle East, I am sure that his conscience will prompt him to take part in the election.

Mr. Montague: That is not an answer.

Mr. Loverseed: I must claim indulgence to deal with various points which the right hon. Gentleman has not answered arising out of the speech made by the hon. Member for Barnstaple (Sir R. Acland), I am referring to men and women in the Forces. When my hon. Friend was speaking a right hon. Gentleman opposite cut in at one point with the remark that that depended upon what is right. We hold the view that it must be right that if a man is good enough to fight and to die for his country he is good enough to vote for it, and that we should make every effort to bring him within the


electorate at by-elections. I have read with interest of the elections in Australia and New Zealand, particularly Australia, where ballot papers were delivered to men in the Forces by people who had to cut their way through jungles to get the ballot papers to them. We experienced a similar difficulty in Eddisbury, but the jungles we had to cut through to get the ballot papers to them were not natural physical jungles but jungles of red tape. My hon. Friend the Member for Barnstaple raised the question whether the initiative in the matter of getting men on the register or the issue of proxies should be with the men or with commanding officers. I raised this point with the Secretary of State for War some time ago, and he stated that a notice had been posted at every station in this country telling men of their duty as regards registering as absent voters and granting proxies. Since that time I have made exhaustive inquiries and at only one station have I found that men have seen that notice or that the notice had been exhibited.
My right hon. Friend stated recently that he would be glad to hear of any measures to facilitate voting by these men, and I would repeat a suggestion which I put forward when I questioned the Secretary of State for War. It is that all men on enlistment should be given a green card, among the other papers they receive, which they could fill in and they could be placed on the register; and if a man were posted overseas he should, at the same time as he is inoculated and has to submit to the other things that happen before going overseas, be given an opportunity of granting a proxy. That would be a simple procedure which would bring home to soldiers their responsibilities in the matter.
One further point concerns the question of men knowing for what they are voting. Within the limited time available between the moving of the Writ and nomination day and polling day there is, even under the new Bill, a very short time allowed for getting information over to these men. I feel that the men who are fighting today are the men on whom we must depend for the building of the future world, that they should be given every encouragement so that the fresh young minds they can bring to bear will carry

us through the difficult years that lie ahead. But I am rather alarmed, and I would like an answer on one point. I have found, and I have reason to believe, that much of the information, many of the booklets and leaflets we are putting over to men in the Forces, are not in fact reaching their destination to-day. If they are not reaching their destination at this time, when there is no urgency about it, I feel we have little guarantee that they will do so during the urgency of an election. I apologise for intervening at this stage on these points, but I feel that these points are very important, and I would like an answer to them.

Question, "That the Bill be now read a Second time," put, and agreed to.

Bill read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the Whole House for the next Sitting Day.—[Mr. Adamson.]

PARLIAMENT (ELECTIONS AND MEETING) [MONEY]

Considered in Committee under Standing Order No. 69.

Resolved,
That, for the purposes of any Act of the present Session making temporary provision as respects parliamentary elections and the registration of parliamentary electors, it is expedient to authorise—

(1) the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of—

(a) expenses incurred by a Registrar-General of births, deaths and marriages, including certain expenses incurred and charges made by officers of certain local authorities; and
(b) expenses incurred by a registration officer, including—

(i) charges for his own services;
(ii) costs incurred by him as party to certain appeals;
(iii) expenses incurred and charges made by officers of certain local authorities or persons appointed in their stead, in and for performing duties at his request or on his requisition; and
(iv) in the case of a registration officer in Northern Ireland, expenses of printing for which arrangements are made by a county council; and

(2) the payment into the Exchequer of fees and certain other sums received by a registration officer in respect of his duties as such an officer."—(King's Recommendation signified.)—[Mr. Herbert Morrison.]

Resolution to be reported upon next Sitting Day.

PROLONGATION OF PARLIAMENT BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Herbert Morrison): I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
This is the fourth year in succession that I have moved the Second Reading of a Bill in substantially the same terms and for the same purposes as the present Bill, and substantially the same considerations obtain this year in favour of the Bill as obtained last year and in the years before. It is of course fully recognised by the Government as it is by the House that the prolongation of the life of Parliament beyond its normal legal life is a serious constitutional step and it is right therefore that the House should regard this legislation, while perhaps not as legislation for long debate in existing circumstances, nevertheless as legislation of a serious constitutional character.
In this legislation the decision as to the prolongation of the life of Parliament is made subject to periodical review, and the Acts only lasts for a year, but notwithstanding this it does not of course necessarily follow that a General Election would and could not take place. But it is right that this Bill should only last for a year in order that both the Government and the House may be required to review the matter year by year and not take any further liberties with the normal workings of the constitution with such a periodical review. This is a constitutional Measure, and the Government are quite properly required to justify the Measure annually to Parliament, so that Parliament may have the opportunity of reviewing the situation in the light of current conditions, and so that if Parliament thought that owing to changes of conditions or other circumstances it was right that it should be brought to an end, it may always be within the power of Parliament itself to secure this. The reasons I gave for the Bill last year were first of all the suspension of the registration of electors, and secondly, the very considerable amount of man-Power and effort which would be involved—I think to no useful purpose—by the holding of a General Election. Moreover, it would be difficult to find an issue upon which to fight the election, as we are all united about the war, and on

the whole I think the House and the country are disposed to feel that, taking it by and large, the Government are not making a bad job of the war. Another reason that I gave was the possibility of heavy raiding, and although many people think of that as behind us, we cannot be sure that heavy raiding will not occur again. Those were the arguments last year.
The first objection, namely, that about the register of electors, is of course a practical one. It would have been wrong to have an election, if we could avoid it, on a stale register, but I agree that, in so far as the new legislation on this subject alters the situation, that argument will be weakened in the course of a few months, though even if the new Bill were passed, the physical labour and administrative strain of putting into operation in all constituencies simultaneously the arrangements for the preparation of a register would involve a material diversion of the war effort. The other arguments against a General Election still, I think, obtain. The possibility of heavy raiding is not a sufficient argument in itself, but if it took place it would cause dislocation, and it would be amusing to the enemy to cause disturbances in the middle of the electoral fight. However, the fundamental reason for the prolongation of the life of Parliament is that it would be seriously prejudicial to the prosecution of the war. It would be out of tune with the spirit of the nation, which is one essentially of national unity during the war, and an issue, as I say, would be difficult to find. Quite apart from the diversion of labour and materials, the distraction of attention from the primary task of fighting the war and the possible promotion of national disunity make it appear to us that it would be helpful to the enemy rather than to this country that this Parliament should come to an end at this point.
There are only two short Clauses in the Bill. One of the Clauses amends the Septennial Act, 1915. It is a curious fact to which attention has previously been called that the Septennial Act, 1915, was actually passed in 1916. It is a constitutional mystery why it became called the Act of 1915. I cannot explain it. Undoubtedly it is the fact that it was not passed until 1916. [Interruption]. I am referring to the Septennial Act, 1715, which was actually passed in 1716. I made a mistake in my first references to


it. I apologise. I got 200 years in advance of the time. I am a little prejudiced that way. Subsequent legislation put the point right as regards 1715 and 1716. The Short Titles Act, 1896, made a specific provision that it should be cited as the Septennial Act, 1715, without prejudice to any other mode of citation, from which I gather it took from 1716 until 1896 for the mistake to be discovered or at any rate put right, but it was put right, and all is well now. Among the reasons for the Septennial Act was the desire expressed in the Preamble of the Act:
To prevent violent and lasting heats and animosities among the subjects of this Realm.
It seems to me that this is relevant to the state of affairs at the present time. Another purpose cited in the Act of 1715 was to prevent "the grievous and burdensome expenses" involved by frequent general elections. In these days of heavy taxation that is a reason which will appeal to hon. Members.
Clause 2 of the Bill applies to Northern Ireland. This Clause was brought in for the first time last year, and there was some discussion about it. I can see certain hon. Members from Northern Ireland here to-day ready and anxious that there may be some discussion about it now. If anybody else starts up they are only too ready to follow by the look on their faces. The case for the provision in respect of Northern Ireland is simple. We have in Northern Ireland a Parliament which is responsible for general legislation and administration, for law and order and good government in that important part of the United Kingdom.
If this Parliament presumes to take power to extend its life it is right that we should make provision whereby the Parliament of Northern Ireland can extend its life. There are no fundamental circumstances about Northern Ireland different from the circumstances obtaining in Great Britain, the arguments which I advanced in respect of Great Britain are, broadly, equally applicable to Northern Ireland, and I think it would be out of proportion for us to prolong ourselves and deny the right to the Parliament of Northern Ireland to prolong itself.
The other question is whether the effective legal action as to the prolongation of the life of the Parliament of North-

ern Ireland should be taken by the United Kingdom Parliament or by the Parliament of Northern Ireland itself. It seems to the Government that the right body to decide upon that point is the House of Commons of Northern Ireland, and therefore the Bill provides that if the House of Commons of Northern Ireland passes a Resolution to prolong its life, it will be prolonged, and if it does not pass a Resolution, it will not be prolonged. That seems to us to be right. The question of the Senate does not arise because the Senate is elected by the House of Commons in Northern Ireland.
That is the case for the Bill, and I think it will commend itself to the House. The Bill lasts for only one year, and the matter will be subject to review in 12 months' time.

Mr. Ammon: I think I should congratulate the right hon. Gentleman in advance, as probably he is going to get another Bill through with a fair amount of general support. That will strengthen him a little for the stormier waters that probably lie ahead at no distant date. It is as well to recall that the Bill would not be before the House were it not for the political truce, and I imagine that my right hon. Friend would not have been in the position to move it. That is all right, so far as the United Kingdom is concerned, but it cannot be said with regard to the inclusion of Northern Ireland.

Professor Savory: May I point out to the hon. Gentleman that Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom?

Mr. Ammon: I will endeavour to show the hon. Gentleman that they are not active in that spirit of unity which has been mentioned by the right hon. Gentleman. As has already been pointed out, the Bill has been based on the spirit of unity and good will which obtains at this period in this country, a thing which cannot be said with regard to Northern Ireland, as is indicated by the asperity with which I was interrupted just now. We have the pleasure to-day of seeing more Members from Northern Ireland than we are usually favoured with, on one occasion and after a long absence. We are delighted to see them. I am particularly interested to see the hon. Members


for North Belfast (Mr. Somerset) and West Belfast (Mr. J. Beattie). They come here united in their support of the Government. I understand that they sit in opposition in another Parliament because they cannot agree. It certainly does not seem right that Northern Ireland should come in under cover of the Bill under entirely false pretences. It has been necessary to combine in this Parliament because of the threat arising out of the war. The same threats and influences mentioned by the right hon. Gentleman do not menace Northern Ireland. There seems even less reason in Northern Ireland than here that there should not be a united Parliament. My hon. Friends and I will not push our attitude to the point of dividing the House, but we think it should be taken notice of that there has not been the same case made out as on other occasions. If and when my right hon. Friend comes forward again for the prolongation of Parliament, we hope it will be only for the prolongation of this Parliament and that other people, having settled their differences and decided that they will unite, may find some way of dealing with the matter themselves.

Sir Percy Harris: In introducing the Bill the right hon. Gentleman rightly emphasised the serious constitutional character of the proposals which it contains. This is the fourth year in which we have decided to continue our life. This Parliament was elected eight years ago on the understanding that it was not to go more than five years, the general custom being that that period usually lasted out. Only the circumstances of war justify us in dealing with the life of Parliament, which it would be otherwise undemocratic to do and difficult to justify on constitutional, Parliamentary or democratic principles. It is as well to remind ourselves that there is nothing to prevent a war-time election. They have had one in Canada, where the Government of the day received increased authority by appealing to the electorate. The same applied in Australia, where they recently went to an election, and the same thing happened there, the Government of the day getting fresh authority by appealing to the people. The same applies to New Zealand.

Mr. McKie: The circumstances are different.

Sir P. Harris: I must be allowed to make my own speech. The hon. Member is always interrupting somebody. I was saying that New Zealand, by having an election, got fresh authority for the Government. The hon. Gentleman, who is a man of great intelligence, said that the circumstances were obviously different. New Zealand and Canada are a long way from the theatre of war, are not subject to black-out and are not liable to enemy raids. Those points do not apply in Australia, which is a theatre of war and is subject to air raids and actually to attacks on its shipping. The Channel is a much narrower protection from attack than any which exist in the case of the three places to which I have referred.
If the Prime Minister had not made a statement that the whole problem of the machinery of elections, methods of election and distribution of seats was to be considered by a Conference, to make recommendations to this House, I should hesitate to give my support to the Bill. We have a special responsibility to the public and to the electors to show that we are using the powers that we are taking for ourselves in order to safeguard their interests and to secure that the next Parliament is elected on as representative a basis as human ingenuity can devise. We have had that promise from the Government for two years, and the case for it now is just as strong as two years ago. If the proposed Conference had been appointed two years ago, we might by now have had the advantage of its Report and be in a stronger position to recommend to the public the passing of the Bill. This House has a special responsibility to convince the public that we are using this authority to the best advantage.
I am not one of those who are critical of this House of Commons. I think it has shown great virility and vitality in all circumstances. An old Parliament, it compares not unfavourably with a new House of Commons in its activities. On the other hand, if we are to go on living without fresh authority from the people we have to be more active in making preparations for the future, when the war is over and a new Parliament comes into existence. We must not present a postwar House of Commons with a blank sheet of paper and no preparations for the great responsibility it will have to fulfil. The


post-war House of Commons will have tremendous tasks, much greater than those of this Parliament, where most of the concern is with the Services and the Executive. It will have to face complicated and difficult social problems which will be far more difficult than those after the last war, when the post-war Parliament made a very bad business of it. The failure of that Parliament to discharge its responsibility was responsible for many of the economic difficulties between the two wars.
We have to insist that the Government, with an old Parliament behind them without the same authority of a Parliament fresh from the electors, have really to be working out and devising plans for the post-war world. We have been asking the Government questions on many occasions to satisfy ourselves that the various Departments of State are getting ready. I do not believe many Members are satisfied that the various Departments are fulfilling that side of the work. I am satisfied with the way in which the Government are prosecuting the war, and I am a loyal supporter of the Prime Minister. We owe him everything. We owe him our safety and our security, and I am satisfied that we have now the best leadership. On the other hand, people are troubled at the lack of evidence and proof that the Government are making preparations for post-war conditions. Therefore, I say that before we pass the Bill we ought to be satisfied that the Government are preparing plans and thinking out policies—making blueprints, to use a popular phrase—for post-war conditions. All political parties have committees working out policies, but we have a shrewd suspicion that the Ministries are not co-ordinated in that respect, and that matters are allowed to drift. Some hon. Members feel, although they are satisfied with the way in which the Government are prosecuting the war, that the Government are not equally active in making preparations for the post-war world.

Mr. John Beattie: I came here to-day with one object only, to show why this House should refuse to ratify the proposal of the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary that the life of the Parliament of Northern Ireland should be extended for a year. I spend

the greater part of my time, and I have spent the greater part of my life, under the Government of Northern Ireland. That Government was established by an Act of Parliament known as the Government of Ireland Act, 1920. We accepted that Act, and we hoped that the guarantees which were given then would be maintained by this House. But, for some reasons which I have been unable to understand, this House was induced to upset that Act by extending the life of that Parliament for 12 months. Again those backstair methods are in use, to seek the support of this House for another extension of 12 months. Not many Members of this House know Northern Ireland—I include in that a number of Members who try to represent Northern Ireland seats in this House. I have lived there, I work there, and I represent the voice and aspirations of the people not only of West Belfast but also of East Belfast, the division I represent in the Northern Ireland Parliament. It would be unbecoming of me to interfere with Clause 1 of this Bill. I give all my support to further extending the life of this Parliament, because I believe that by continuing in session this Parliament would be serving a useful purpose. But I could not say the same thing about the Parliament of the six counties of Ireland known as North East Ulster. They have not functioned as any reasonable Parliament should function in war.
Let me give one of the fundamental reasons why I think that Government should be sent about its business. At the moment we have in Northern Ireland over 20,000 registered unemployed. We have another 5,000 to 10,000 people who are anxious to come to this country to give their skill and their services in the interests of victory, but they are prohibited from moving outside the shores of the six counties. Those people are unemployed, but they are not included among the registered unemployed. We have our own local unemployment, of which the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Labour is fully conversant. A large percentage of those who would wish to come to this side of the water are not allowed to leave because of an organised suspicion, which is prompted by a desire to keep a state of confusion in the minds of Members of this House, and to make people believe that sinister


organisations are at work to sabotage the war effort of Northern Ireland. I want to repudiate that suggestion, which was conveyed to Members on this side who have visited Northern Ireland in the past few years. The manufacturers of those illegal organisations, who are a danger to the national interest, the people who have fathered and financed them, are the very people to whom a further extension of Parliamentary life is now to be given. It is a crying shame.
The right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary has a long experience of the Ulster Tory. He will remember the years from 1914 to 1920, and he knows what happened in 1920, 1921 and 1922 to the upholders of Socialism in Northern Ireland because they dared to express their political outlook in the precincts of the City of Belfast, their own home town. This House will do serious damage to our war output in Northern Ireland if the Home Secretary is allowed to proceed with Clause 2 of this Bill. I have known the right hon. Gentleman as a democrat for many years. He has made reference to my facial expression, but I know that that was done in a humorous way. Both he and I are not going up the hill but down, and if we entered for a beauty competition I do not think that either of us would be in the prize list. But I know that he is aware of the political conditions in Northern Ireland, and I ask him to beware of his new-found friends. Also I ask the Parliamentary Secretary, a little lady, for whom I had much respect in days gone past, to be very careful of her new-found friends and of the methods that she is using to propagate Toryism in Northern Ireland.
I am sent here by the organised labour and trade union movement. I might have been doing useful work at home, but in the interest of national decency and of the war effort, I have made the journey here, and I am going to endeavour to get the party of which I am honoured to be a member to give some support to the removal of Clause 2 from the Bill. The Government of Northern Ireland cannot agree among themselves. Within the past 12 months they have changed within themselves. That is the first time I have heard of such a disagreement among them. They are all of the same kidney. If anything, the Government which is

now in office has less appeal for the working people of Northern Ireland than any of the two previous Governments of Northern Ireland. This Government must be challenged, so that the people of Northern Ireland may have an opportunity to say who is to be the Government of that part of the country. They have not that opportunity. They have had the change of two Governments and have not been allowed to vote. The right hon. Gentleman knows how voting is done in Northern Ireland, but there is one thing I want him to remember. They can teach the British electorate how to vote. I heard the right hon. Gentleman talking about the business voter and overseas men. I had some in West Belfast and they could teach him a lesson or two. In spite of all his knowledge and experience of electoral reform, I would ask him to come the next time to West Belfast and see what happens when you are fighting the Ulster Tories, and he will get his eyes opened. I hope that he is taking my comments in a friendly spirit, as I do not intend them to be otherwise. My manner and methods may seem to be that way, but it is not deliberate.
In the "Manchester Guardian" I read that the Home Secretary says he doubts whether the Parliamentary situation in Northern Ireland could be described as Government and Opposition. That is his expressed opinion. The composition of that House at the moment consists of 36 Unionists and 16 members on Opposition. I happen to be the accredited leader of the Labour Opposition, and whether I justify that position or not is not for me to say. Sixteen members in opposition to the official Unionists in the Northern Ireland Parliament is, I should say, a position equal to that of 32 Members in the British Isles. It is three times harder for a Member of the Opposition to win a seat in Northern Ireland against a Tory than it is for such a Member to win a seat against a Tory in Great Britain. If you win a seat in Northern Ireland against a Tory, you have done some useful work. I do not go outside my own little country to talk about elections, because I have not taken part in many elections in England. I have taken part in our elections in 26 counties and the six counties, and if I can be of any service in Great Britain—in Scotland, England or Wales—at the next General Election I shall be willing to


come over and give them help. The part of the Bill which in my opinion is very desirable would be the keeping in honour bound the Government of Ireland Act, 1920, and I make this appeal in a sincere and earnest way because my voice here to-day is the voice of organised labour and trade unionists and also of thousands of Tories in Ulster. A certain type of Tory has got into the Government machine and is asking "How much can I get for the loyalty which I preach?" I say openly that Toryism in Ulster is conditional loyalty.
If this House prevented Ulster from getting her fair share of financial support, they would go elsewhere to get that financial support, and they would carry their loyalty with them. They did it in 1912, when the present Prime Minister came over and when I was stoned because I saved the life of the present Prime Minister. If the Ulster Tories had had their way, you would have had no Prime Minister to-day leading this country in the way it is being led. I do not want to be provocative, but I want the Home Office to understand the condition of affairs in Northern Ireland. I do not want to hear people sniping at my brother Irishmen across the border and to hear them talking about Irish political life when they know nothing about Irish political life other than through the universities and people who do not belong to the country. I feel it in my bones that I am entitled to speak in this way to this House. If in Northern Ireland, and even in Southern Ireland, the Labour movement is ever going to develop, we require the assistance of Labour in Great Britain. We of the Labour movement in Ireland are joined hand-in-hand with the British Labour movement in all matters appertaining to the social well-being and the uplifting of the working class.

Sir Herbert Williams: On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. May I ask whether we are discussing this Bill or a subject more appropriate to the Address, because the hon. Member seems to be going rather wide of the subject?

Mr. Speaker: I have been listening to the hon. Member, and I appreciate that he is talking on Clause 2. He is entitled to say how bad the government of Northern Ireland is in his opinion and

therefore that its Parliament should not have its life extended.

Sir H. Williams: We are not prolonging the life of tile Government but the life of Parliament, and there is still some difference between the two.

Mr. Beattie: I am sorry if I have not pleased the hon. Gentleman, but I am a stickler on constitutional points myself. I am discussing Clause 2 only and trying to show justification for the right hon. Gentleman to withdraw Clause 2. The reason that the Government of Northern Ireland have made this pernicious back-stair influence in this House is because they are afraid to go to the country. This Government had to have a revolution within their own party and overthrow a certain number of Tories in Northern Ireland before they were able to get into the job. They have been in the job four or five months, and people are asking why, if South Africa, Canada, Australia and New Zealand can have an election, Northern Ireland cannot. Northern Ireland is not in the war effort in any respect like the countries I have mentioned. They have their own employment. There is no war effort from the Government point of view. We of the working class want the Government to get a chance and in the meantime to get the war effort put upon a sound footing and developed to an extent that we shall be producing an equal amount per head per man as you have been doing in Great Britain for a number of years past. We in Northern Ireland are not doing our share, and the Government are responsible for our not doing it. On behalf of the whole Labour movement, I ask him to withdraw Clause 2. If he does so, we can then have an election, and I guarantee that if one took place there would be no hindrance of any kind to the war effort. If after such an election the Tories now in power are still there, we can still join together in the common effort, but I ask that we should be given an opportunity of challenging the people who are at the moment sabotaging the war effort of Northern Ireland.

Mr. Somerset: I have represented North Belfast in this House since 1929, and I would like to say to the hon. Member for West Belfast (Mr. J. Beattie) that I have very much in mind


the circumstances in which he fought his election, the conditions which prevailed and the fact that at the last minute he made a declaration which gained him many thousands of votes.

Mr. Beattie: On a point of Order. Is it in Order for the hon. Member to make such an inference? The declaration which was made was not made by me; it was made by the Socialist Party.

Mr. Somerset: The hon. Member, earlier in his speech, invited the Home Secretary to go to Belfast so that he could show him how things were run. Well, I do not think the Home Secretary would adopt the procedure that was followed in the hon. Member's election. I cannot see what the hon. Member wants to get at. We have in Northern Ireland a very strong Government. That Government has been changed. The hon. Member clamoured for that change, and now it has been changed he is not satisfied. He wants an election. He cannot have it both ways. If the hon. Member gets in another year, he will be lucky; I do not think we shall see his face here again after the next election. I cannot see why he does not want the people in Northern Ireland to have the same continuity as the people in this country. The hon. Member seems to forget what is the constitution of the Northern Ireland Government. One of his own colleagues who is Leader of the Labour Party is now Minister of Home Security.

Mr. Beattie: He was never Leader of the Labour Party.

Mr. Somerset: The Minister of Labour served at the bench and in the shipyards, and the whole of that Government is just as much a National Government as this Government here is. I notice that the hon. Member omitted to say a single word about his own constituency of West Belfast. He did not tell this House that most of the arms, ammunition, explosives and implements of war which have been found have been found in West Belfast.

Mr. Beattie: On a point of Order. Is it in Order for the hon. Member to say that somebody in my Division is rebellious to the British and that we are storing arms and ammunition for the killing of British Forces? I say that that is out of Order altogether.

Mr. Speaker: I understood the hon. Member to say that arms and ammunition were manufactured and made in West Belfast and were not being illegally stored.

Mr. Beattie: I said it for him.

Mr. Somerset: The hon. Member also said that Northern Ireland Members were not very much in evidence here. I do not think any Member of this House has been more regular in attendance than I have. I think this is about the second time the hon. Member has been here, and he has taken this opportunity to get at the Government of Northern Ireland. It is wrong that he should come here and make such a tirade and an attack upon a decent body of men.

Mr. Speaker: I am bound to point out that whether the hon. Member for West Belfast (Mr. J. Beattie) was doing right or wrong, he was entitled to talk on this Bill. His conduct in so doing does not lie within the purview of this Bill, but I think we ought to get back to the question of whether we should extend Parliament by one year or not.

Mr. Somerset: I bow to your Ruling, Sir, but I would like to give one reason why we should have another year as we have in this House.

Mr. Stokes: The 23rd year.

Mr. Somerset: When the late Prime Minister of Northern Ireland retired he received a letter from my right hon. Friend the Member for Epping (Mr. Churchill), who said:
… That was a dark and dangerous hour. We were alone and had to face single-handed the full fury of the Germans' attack, raining down death and destruction on our cities. … But for the loyalty of Northern Ireland we should have been confronted with slavery and death.
This country is indebted to the Government of Northern Ireland. In no part of the country was there so much voluntary enlistment in the Forces of the Crown. There is no conscription there, but thousands of our young men volunteered. For all these reasons I hope the House will give Northern Ireland the same facilities that they have taken for themselves.

Mr. Edmund Harvey: I am glad that you, Sir, called the attention of the House to the main purpose of the Bill, which is the


extension of the life of this Parliament by yet another year. I think the Home Secretary has given convincing reasons why a further extension must be regarded as a necessity, though a regrettable necessity, and yet we surely cannot do our duty as representatives, if, in passing the Second Reading of such a Bill, we do not record our feeling that we do it with a sense of reluctance and shame. In the records of our history long Parliaments have been too often bad Parliaments. Their records are not inspiring, and, behind the sense of reluctance that we feel in this respect to prolonging our own life, we must have the thought that it is wrong because we are not fully representative. Some of us were elected under very different conditions many years ago, others have been elected recently, but by a diminished electorate from which were excluded a very large number of people whose voices ought to have been heard. Our only justification is the necessity of the war, the extreme difficulty of holding a fair election now, and the hope that the next Parliament will be a better and more fully representative Parliament than this one has been even from the first. It is that hope that ought to justify us in cordially supporting the Government in passing this Bill.
My right hon. Friend the Member for South-West Bethnal Green (Sir P. Harris) has expressed his satisfaction at the action of the Government in responding to requests, made on the three previous occasions when a similar Bill was moved for full opportunity to be given for the consideration of fundamental measures of electoral reform. I should like, on behalf of Members of all parties who joined in those requests, to thank the Government for the way in which they have been met. We have been promised something which makes it possible for us to pass the Bill wholeheartedly. A thorough inquiry into our electoral system is to take place in the near future under the highest auspices, and we may hope that, as a result, the Parliament which will succeed this will be more fully representative of the mind and will of the nation than any that we have yet known. If that is the outcome, it will be something that we shall not regret. It will be something that we can be thankful for that in passing this Measure

we are opening the door, in view of the Government's promises, to a careful and impartial consideration of these issues in an atmosphere, I hope, of understanding and mutual sympathy such as we have rarely known in our past history, which will help us to understand the point of view of different parties and to see the good in all in a way that we have not done in time of peace. We may hope that as the outcome we shall get an agreed system of electoral reform which will give us a Parliament in the future, fully representative of the mind and will of the nation.

Professor Savory: On this question of the prolongation of this Parliament and the Parliament of Northern Ireland I need only say that the case is absolutely parallel. The representatives of Northern Ireland are elected on exactly the same register as the other Members of this House.

Mr. J. Beattie: That is not correct.

Professor Savory: Registration for the election of Member to this House is exactly the same here as the register over there, and therefore, if you are going to prolong this Parliament, you have no reason whatever for not prolonging the Parliament of Northern Ireland. The conditions are exactly the same. The register is completely out of date and, further, you could not have a fair election, as so many electors are fighting overseas and a very large proportion of the women are over here doing war work. This House would be amazed at the immense proportion of electors in my constituency who are fighting for this country overseas. {Interruption.] I am refering to the constituency of the University of Belfast, which I have the honour to represent, and I repeat that the proportion of the electors who are fighting overseas is extraordinarily high—at least as high as any other University in the United Kingdom.
The hon. Member for West Belfast (Mr. J. Beattie) has made an attack. I thought it was irrelevant but, as he made it, perhaps I shall be allowed, without any bitterness, very calmly to reply to it. He has said that the Government of Northern Ireland is incompetent, largely on account of the fact that there is a very large amount of unemployment. He


has given the figure as 20,000. I understood from a recent speech by the Prime Minister in the Parliament of Northern Ireland that the figures were very much less. However, even assuming that the hon. Member's figures are correct, how are they accounted for? You must remember that the Government of Northern Ireland unanimously came here and asked you to extend conscription to that country. That demand was backed up by the whole of the Ulster Members in this Parliament. It was the unanimous resolution of the Ulster Unionist Council of Northern Ireland.

Mr. J. Beattie: No.

Professor Savory: I am telling you the truth. You preferred to allow yourselves to be influenced by the Prime Minister of a neutral country, who suddenly summoned his Parliament in Southern Ireland and issued a threat against introducing conscription in Northern Ireland, a country with which he had nothing whatever to do.

Mr. Speaker: The question of conscription in Northern Ireland seems to be a long way from the subject we are discussing.

Professor Savory: I bow to your Ruling, as I always do, Mr. Speaker. I was only referring to the matter to show that it was one of the reasons for the lack of employment. Had conscription been applied there would have been far less unemployment. Further, the Government of Northern Ireland has been doing its utmost. We have been told here by the Minister of Supply and by the Minister of Labour that the Government of Northern Ireland is doing its very best to get you to establish as many factories as you possibly could in Northern Ireland in order to employ surplus labour there and thanks to the efforts of our present Prime Minister a great deal has been done in that connection. Hon. Members would be surprised if they were to go over there to see the immense amount of work that is being done for the war. Enormous quantities of munitions are being made over there, an enormous number of ships is being built, aetoplane cloth is being made almost exclusively in Northern Ireland and almost the whole of the parachutes. We are providing

shirts for your troops and working in every possible way. We are carrying on an immense war effort and are prepared to do a great deal more. A marvellous tribute was paid to us by your Prime Minister on the retirement of our former Prime Minister, Mr. Andrews, when he said that Northern Ireland had placed all her resources at your disposal and that without that this war could not have been won. Very well then. The Government of Northern Ireland has come forward and it has asked you, as it is bound to do, under the Act of 1920, to prolong its Parliament.
Last year, before we had the pleasure of the presence of the hon. Member for West Belfast a charge was made against the Government of Northern Ireland that it was only a one party Government and that we should form a coalition. Since then, of the three Labour Members, we took one into the Government, Mr. Midgley, a very prominent Socialist, a man who had been leader of the Labour Party. With regard to the six Nationalist Members, four of them do not attend—they only took the oath so as to draw their salaries—and I am afraid that if you asked the other two to coalesce with the Government of Northern Ireland they would refuse to do so. In order to have a Coalition Government you have to coalesce with somebody. We have coalesced with a very distinguished Socialist, Mr. Midgley well-known to all Members of the Labour Party and he is working hand in glove at the present moment with the Government of Northern Ireland.

Mr. J. Beattie: He is a Member of the Tory party.

Professor Savory: No, he is a Labour Member. I have spoken to him and he has said again and again, that he has not renounced any of his Socialist opinions but he has -joined with the Government of Northern Ireland in order to carry on the war effort. The hon. Member has said that there should be an election and that we should not prevent the election taking place. Is there anything more certain in this world than that if we did have an election, we should repeat the result of February 1938 and that the existing Government would be returned by an overwhelming majority, as it always has


been. We have had election after election and every time the Government has been returned by overwhelming majorities. No one can doubt that the Government of Northern Ireland represents the opinion of the people of Northern Ireland. If there were to be an election the result would be exactly the same as in 1938, but, as I have pointed out, the election would be unfair, because a very large number of the best of the electors would be completely disfranchised owing to the fact that they are fighting for the battle of truth and justice on the Continent of Europe and elsewhere. This little country of Ulster has contributed so much to the victory. It has provided General Montgomery, General Alexander, Sir Alan Brooke, Sir John Dill. That is a list of great names all coming from noble Ulster families, all ready to fight for your cause and it is regrettable that a Member from Ulster should come here to-day and slander his own countrymen. I should like to remind him of that old Ulster proverb "It is an ill bird that bewrays its own nest."

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr. H. Morrison: I beg to move,
That the Proceedings on Government Business be exempted at this Day's Sitting from the provisions of the Standing Order (Sittings of the House).
I think it may be for the convenience of the House to move this Motion. We want to get the Bill to-night and I am sure the House will give it, but the Debate might just go over the time.

Mr. Buchanan: Is the right hon. Gentleman fixing any time?

Mr. Morrison: No.

Question put, and agreed to.

PROLONGATION OF PARLIAMENT BILL

Question again proposed, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

Mr. G. Strauss: My speech will not necessitate the prolonging of the Debate. I think my view of this Bill is probably shared by very many Members. I feel there can be no doubt

that, under present conditions, an election would be so difficult—while it would not be impossible it would be extraordinarily inconvenient—that we must avoid it if we possibly can. Therefore I support the Bill but I want to state definitely my disagreement with a qualification which has been placed on the Bill by the Government through the Prime Minister.
Speaking the other day in the House the Prime Minister said:
This present House of Commons, which has so long exceeded its normal constitutional life and will shortly be asking for a renewal of the lease—a matter which does not rest entirely in our hands alone—has no right, except with a very general measure of agreement, to step outside the one function by which its continued existence is justified, namely the prosecution of the war."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 13th October, 1943; col. 924, Vol. 392.]
I disagree entirely that the one function which justifies us continuing our life for another year is the prosecution of the war. I agree entirely that it is our chief function but this Parliament, if it is to continue and be worth while, has the general function of looking after the welfare and future of the people of the country. I maintain definitely that, at the present stage of the war, one of our main functions should be during the coming year to discuss our future and our post-war plans and what sort of country we are to have when the war is over. I maintain that unless we accept that as our attitude during the coming year, we shall be leading the country into great danger. Because if the war is over at the end of the year, or shall we say in 18 months' or two years' time, and we have accepted the injunction of the Prime Minister that our sole function during the coming year is to discuss and consider the prosecution of the war, and we have not laid our plans for the post-war era, then this country will be in a very serious position. We shall be completely unprepared, we may find ourselves in an almost chaotic situation, and we shall not be able to play our part in post-war Europe, because our own house will not be in order. In such circumstances I think this House would then have betrayed its duty to the people of this country who have elected it.
If that really is the view of the Prime Minister, that because we have a Coalition Government this House is inhibited from discussing other matters and settling other


matters except the prosecution of the war, then I think the House ought to consider whether that is not too high a price to pay, for the time has come, I think every Member will agree, when we must be discussing and settling these problems. They could be discussed and settled if there were one party Government, so why in the world, because the parties are co-operating at the moment in the prosecution of the war, there should not be at the same time co-operation in hammering out the future policy of the country, I cannot understand. Therefore, I say most definitely—and I am sure I am expressing the views of very many Members in this House—that we accept this Bill because it is quite plainly necessary, but we do not accept the qualification put upon it by the Prime Minister when he said that the one function of our continuing our life is the prosecution of the war. I, and I think many others, believe, we now have the almost equally important function of discussing the very important problems which will arise out of the war and the victory that will follow it.

Mr. Beverley Baxter: I think that, like many other Members of this House, I shall support this Bill in the hope that it is the last time we shall be asked to do so. When in 1940 the country was placed in a great crisis it seemed a wise and spontaneous act for a Coalition Government to be formed. That crisis in its intensity has passed. Now victory is reasonably within sight, and the problems of post-war development are closer and more urgent all the time. Therefore the real reason for maintaining this Parliament another year is to maintain the Coalition Government. I wonder whether we think enough of the effect of this upon the country. For decades upon decades the government of this country was carried on by the principle of the Government and His Majesty's loyal Opposition. It worked through great crises, it brought and developed human liberty to its present state here, and was an inspiration in the outside world. Then we said, "Here is a crisis; a war which cannot be handled on that basis. We do not want His Majesty's loyal Opposition, we do not want an Opposition at all, save by a band of guerillas who have got in here as Independents." That to my mind is a denial of the very strength of our Parliamentary system.
What is happening in Canada? There is a Liberal Government under Mr. Mackenzie King which is carrying out a very fine war effort indeed. The Conservative Party in opposition spurs the Government on to greater and greater efforts. It does not oppose the Government, it helps them. Are there not going to be great problems after the war? Shall we then have a request and a demand for the continuation of this Parliament after the war and the continuance of Coalition, because anyone who imagines that when the fighting stops there will not be important problems of great magnitude imagines a vain thing. Even when this war ceases, are we to say that these probblems are so vast that the British Parliamentary system in its normal condition is not strong enough to face them and therefore, "On with this Parliament, on with the Coalition"? When the time comes to return to party Government—and party Government is the great guarantor of our political liberties—by party Government alone can we choose a Government and reject a Government and give the people the expression of their own wishes and demands—are we to say to the people, "Now times are so good, can we not return to the easy ways of the past; now we can restore parties to their natural position"? What will the young people say who came of voting age in 1935? Year after year we have said to them, "You have inherited the franchise won by the efforts of our ancestors, but you shall not exercise that franchise. You are old enough to go and die, you are old enough to help work in the factories. Now you are old enough to be married and have children, but the franchise won by the people of this country through many years shall not be exercised by you."
Are we to say to them when the time is up, when this condition of holy matrimony between the Socialists and the Conservatives ends, are we to say, "Here is your discredited system; you can have it back again"? Do you not think that throughout the country, especially among the young, there are doubts about the efficacy of Parliament and parties? Are we not by the very vacuum which we are creating inviting something else to take its place? Talk to any young people. Every hon. Mem-


ber knows that what I say is true. They are worried, they are impatient, they doubt our system of Government. We are storing up great trouble, and the spectacle of this House willing itself another year of life is not an impressive one.
I will conclude what I have to say with this. I sincerely hope that this is the last time we shall be asked to support such a Bill. I hope this Parliament will renew its life by the only way in which it has the right to renew its life or should renew its life, by the mandate of the people. They have done it in Canada, in the United States, in South Africa, New Zealand and Australia. Not one of these elections has resulted in upheaval or a lessening of the war effort. On the contrary, by the very opportunity of the people to express their determination at the polls they have revitalised their Governments and Parliaments in the process. We say in this tiny Island that it is too complicated. We can have a by-election, which does not disturb people unduly, but if what happens in one constituency happens in 600 it becomes an unworkable problem. I cannot see why, if by-elections can be held, an election cannot be held in 600 constituencies. It would do the people good to express the power which should be in their hands. I am much obliged to the House for being patient with me, but I feel strongly on this point. I would like to think that, before another year elapses we may not only see victory for our arms but that we will reconstitute the authority of the people. May we give back to this House the dignity which we ourselves are taking from it.

Sir Richard Acland: I am grateful to the last speaker and to the hon. Baronet the Member for South-West Bethnal Green (Sir P. Harris), without whose speeches the Bill, so far as it applies to England, Scotland and Wales, would have gone without anybody noticing that Clause 1 is important. I regard it as extremely important. I do not think that we should take a step which means usurping to ourselves the rights of the electors for another 12 months without considering the fundamental justification for it. I do not regard the speech of the Home Secretary as justification on this point. He seemed to me to say that it would not be con-

venient to give the electors their rights any time during the, next 12 months or so. That may be so, but why? I commend the speed with which the Home Secretary acted on the Report of the Departmental Committee which started sitting about 11 months ago, but this problem of Parliament renewing its life throughout what we knew from the start was to be a long war, has been envisaged since some time about 1940. If some preparation had been made from then on, we might now be in a position to do something. If steps had been taken to inform the soldiers abroad of the issues on which they would have to vote, and so on, it would have been something. I need not enlarge upon this aspect of the matter. It is sufficient to say that if we had started this job early enough and put the same will behind it as did Australia, New Zealand and Canada, we could have done it. It is not enough for the Government to say that if you did not prolong Parliament, you would face an impossible situation created by the negligence of the Government, and therefore you must give this negligent Parliament and Government another 12 months of life because it has been too negligent to create the machinery for renewal.
Until we heard the speech of the hon. Member who last spoke, it did not seem that anyone appreciated the fact that democracy pays. This thing that we are fighting for yields results. Moral forces do count. When workers and fighters are given an opportunity of realising that they are important, that they count in deciding policy, then they become better workers and better fighters. The idea is that it would take a lot of trouble to run elections, and mean diverting efforts, and that we should get nothing for it. But it is not the case that we would get nothing for it. We would get higher morale and clearer understanding of what we are fighting for. I wish it were possible to show hon. Members some of the letters received from members of the Forces and from workers in industry, saying how grateful they are to the tiny little organisation with which I am associated for keeping some of the political issues in front of as many people as we can reach with such very limited means as we can employ. They do say that our almost universally—but not quite, universally—unsuccessful efforts in this direction have made all the difference to their ability to


carry on their war effort either in the fighting line or in the factory, with enthusiasm. So this thing pays.
We come to something more important. Apparently the Home Secretary did not feel it necessary to discuss the fundamental justifications lying behind the Bill, and the fact passed by almost unnoticed, that the grounds on which we are being asked to renew our life, have changed in the last two or three years. I have not got the actual speeches with me, so I am not sure whether it is two or three years that has witnessed the change. At any rate, one, two or three years ago we were asked to renew our life on the ground that hon. Members of this House were, by and large, adequate receiving sets, receiving the ever-changing and developing opinions of the electorate as a whole and expressing them here, not only on issues confined to the strictly military war effort but on all the issues, post-war prospects and so on. That picture of this House as a receiving set for finding out and interpreting the will of our population, has been completely changed, largely by a speech made by the Prime Minister on the subject of coal. The Prime Minister justified his determination to dismiss, in advance, the views of those citizens who believe that the mines should be nationalised, on the ground that this House had not been given a mandate to do it. In my view, the Prime Minister in making that speech was talking constitutional nonsense, and, in my view, he ought to have known it. It is nonsense.

Mr. Magnay: The hon. Member is on the wrong wave length; that is what is the matter with him.

Sir R. Acland: I hope that that remark will be recorded, to show how people will intervene with trivial points like that. It seems to me nonsense to say that this House cannot do this, that or the other thing because it has not got a mandate. This House has a Conservative majority four times as big as it ought to be, on the votes cast in the 1935 election. On those votes the Conservative Party is entitled to a majority of 50 members over all other parties put together, but it has a majority of several hundreds. So the whole set-up of the House is wrong, and it has been from the very start of this Parliament. It does not reflect the opinions of the people and never has. I am not going into the varying admissions

extracted from Lord Baldwin in debate, which showed how the issues had been falsely put before the country in 1935. But let us look through the list. This House voted—and I and others with me in the party I was associated with then voted—for an enormous expenditure on armaments, without a mandate. This House had no mandate for anything more than filling up gaps. This House decided to drop the League of Nations as the sheet-anchor of our policy, without a mandate. This House decided to introduce conscription in time of peace, without a mandate. This House declared war, without a mandate.

Mr. Magnay: rose—

Sir R. Acland: I am not giving way to cheapjacks! I am sorry. This House passed a Bill giving to the Government powers of conscription over all life and all property—and I am not going to say that that was without a mandate.

Dr. Russell Thomas: But the hon. Member changed his party without a mandate.

Sir R. Acland: That demonstration suggests to me that some of the things I am saying are of importance. Otherwise, a silly little point of that kind, to which there is an overwhelming answer, would not have extracted so much pleasure from hon. Members, who know that they are in the wrong. Without any mandate, I changed my party. I went back to the people I am responsible to, the 100 or so elected people who worked for me in my election. There is no other body of men with whom any Member can consult between elections except the men or the association by whom he is supported in his contest.

Mr. Quintin Hogg: rose—

Sir R. Acland: I am not going to give way to the hon. Member until I have finished.

Mr. Hogg: Did you try the electors? Does democracy pay?

Hon. Members: Go on.

Sir R. Acland: I just wanted the hon. Member to come off the boil, that is all. I put it to these people in my constituency whether it was their wish to have a by-election right away or whether they would support me until the end of this Parlia-


ment. By a 10 to 1 majority, I had their support. That being so, who was there left to challenge me to go to a by-election?

Mr. Hogg: The electors—democracy.

Sir R. Acland: On that point my hon. Friend is mistaken. He is constitutionally mistaken because, if he will listen to me, it is the constitutonal fact that each one of us is elected for the life-time of his Parliament and if any one of us received a postcard from all the electors in our constituency saying, "I disagree with you and want you to resign," on a constitutional issue we have the right to say then and there, "I will not resign and between now and the next election I am going to show you I am right." That is the constitutional position of every Member and is purely a concession from our cast-iron and indisputable constitutional right. Most of us would find it very difficult to remain as Members, if those individuals on our supporting associations who had worked for us at the previous election, by a majority asked us to resign. Their rights are purely moral but very powerful. To give an example, there was not one of the Liberal Members who criticised the Boer War who had a mandate for doing so. There is not one of them who would not have been rejected at the time of the Boer War—including the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George)—if he had gone to the electorate. Those Members would have had the right to say, "You elected me for the period of this Parliament to keep my promises on issues on which I made promises, to use my judgment on other issues and to speak and to justify myself or to fail to justify myself when the next election comes."
I immensely regret this personal digression that has been forced upon me. I was saying that this one act of conscripting life and property did get a mandate from the people subsequently. It was that Act, I believe, almost as much as anything else which gave the people the feeling that things were all right and which resulted in the prodigious efforts that followed at about that time. That was an overwhelming mandate for an overwhelmingly popular Act. What has this House done? In interpreting that

Act for which it obtained a mandate this House has conscripted life in no uncertain manner. In my view this action, taken by itself, was right. But when, within three months of the passing of this Act to conscript property, a court of law so interpreted this Act—on which so many of our citizens had set their hopes—to mean that the Government's rights, except the case of iron railings, were limited to the right to purchase property at the full price or lease it at the full rent this House, without a mandate, did nothing about it. What is left of the Prime Minister's plea that this House cannot consider the nationalisation of the coal mines because it has not a mandate?
At the same time the Prime Minister said that the House was governed not by unanimity but by a majority; and there are 400 individuals who were elected into this House eight years ago and nothing can be done to which they, as individuals, can object. That is the position we have reached. Nothing can be done in relation to the political development of the war itself, or the preparation of post-war plans except what 400 hon. Members on the opposite side of this House, as individuals, think to be right. This is an increasingly intolerable situation, particularly because the Prime Minister is gravely wrong in thinking this House is primarily concerned with the military prosecution of the war. That is one subject with which we can hardly be concerned at all, because it is absolutely impossible for the Government to give us information on which we can exercise an effective decision. There are few hon. Members who now want to criticise the physical conduct of the war. What we are all concerned with is making plans for the welfare of our country as a whole, and with the political conduct of this war. I say that the 400 hon. Members opposite, whose individual opinions now govern this country, without any check from the electors, are in every way improper persons to be charged with the political and moral conduct of this campaign against Fascism. Is there any hon. Member opposite who would dare to read "The Trial of Mussolini"? Is there one who can face it and take his medicine? This book, written by "Cassius," is published by Gollancz at 2s. 6d.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Milner): The hon. Member's remarks are not relevant to the Debate.

Sir R. Acland: When the hon. Member for West Belfast (Mr. J. Beattie) was speaking on Clause 2 Mr. Speaker ruled that he was entitled to state, as a ground for opposing Clause 2, his belief that the Parliament of Northern Ireland was, in effect, a pretty bad show. Therefore, I submit that I am entitled to do the same thing now by saying that if hon. Members will consult the source of wisdom to which I have referred they will find that one Conservative leader after another specifically endorsed every crime that Fascism has committed. The destruction of democracy, the browbeating of the workers' organisations, the tyranny, the connived murders of political opponents, the acts of international aggression, the preparations for war, the glorying in war—all these crimes were committed by Fascism away back in 1923, 1924, 1925 and 1926, and after that the great leaders of the Conservative party and of Conservative opinion went over to Italy and fawned on this thing. There is hardly a Member opposite who is not morally implicated in this condonation of the thing that we are up against.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Some of the hon. Baronet's remarks are really irrelevant to the Bill. I must ask him to be relevant.

Sir R. Acland: I should very much dislike to come into conflict with you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I have virtually made my point, but I must protest all the same, in order to safeguard future occasions, against what appears to be your Ruling. When I am discussing the renewal of the House of Commons by the uncontrolled will of a majority of that House, it must be relevant to produce any and every argument we may choose, in order to support our view that the majority of this House is not qualified to reappoint itself for another 12 months to run the moral and political—because that is all that we do run—the moral and political struggle against Fascism. The military struggle is not in our hands, and every time any Member of the House has tried to affect the military struggle against Fascism he has been told, rightly, "Little boy, you know nothing about it, so keep out where you cannot do any good." It is the moral and political struggle against Fascism with which the House is concerned. I say, and I claim to have the right to say, that there is not a Member opposite who is not implicated up to the

hilt in the repeated condonation of Fascist crimes committed by his leaders. [HON. MEMBERS: "Withdraw."] What am I asked to withdraw? [HON. MEMBERS: "What is false."] What is false in what I have said? I have said that your leaders condoned Fascism up to the hilt from 1923 to 1938 and you endorsed their condonation. Now you claim to be fit and proper people to run the moral and political side of this struggle against Fascism. You claim to be fit and proper people to take this thing under your sole discretion.

Mr. Quintin Hogg: Is it in Order, Mr. Speaker, to address you in this way?

Mr. Speaker: Hon. Members should address the Chair.

Sir R. Acland: Hon; Members opposite are doing this thing and can only defend themselves by silence in order to escape from arguments which they know perfectly well cannot be met. Because it is absolutely impossible to deny the fact that the whole of the Conservative Party machine endorsed Nazism, and liked it, and endorsed Fascism, and liked it, as long as they regarded it as a great bulwark against Soviet Russia. [Interruption.] There may have been one or two Conservative rebels against the machine, but I was talking about the machine. Rather than face that charge, from which they cannot escape, they will meet us with an absolute, stony silence. There will be no reply. But the British people know and they are absolutely sick and tired of the party opposite.

Mr. Magnay: That is why you never win elections.

Sir R. Acland: The reason why the party opposite are not swept out in the existing by-elections is simply that they play up the name of the Prime Minister.

Mr. Magnay: So do you.

Sir R. Acland: No. The Conservative Party are winning by-elections because they simply play up to the single name of the Prime Minister. The other reason they are winning, and here I address myself to hon. Members above the Gangway on this side, is because the forces that want something different from that party over there are only at the moment firing


on one out of a possible 16 cylinders. That is not my fault, because I am taking part in the only cylinder that is firing; it is in their cylinder that the sparking-plugs have got sooted up. That is why those people opposite are getting away with this thing. I beg hon. Members above the Gangway to recognise in the coming 12 months that that is true, and that is why we have this country's policy of A.M.G.O.T. and playing about with a little king and a Fascist General and why all the war criminals who are down on the Yugoslav patriots' list are being put into high positions. This question has to be taken seriously in the next 12 months, otherwise, while our fighting men and working men win this war, we in this House may lose the peace.

Mr. Quintin Hogg: The hon. Baronet the Member for Barnstaple (Sir R. Acland) is always complaining that Members on this side do not answer his arguments. The reason is that his arguments are all mutually destructive. He begins by complaining that the Government do not consult democracy. He says that democracy always yields good results. I agree with him, if that is his contention, but I thought it was very much more than a debating point when an hon. Friend below the Gangway pointed out that the hon. Baronet failed to consult democracy himself. He has changed his party, he has changed almost all the political opinions he has put forward, but he will not dare to face his electors. It is true that he is legally entitled to take that attitude, but what is morally wrong cannot be politically right. If I had been guilty of that conduct, I should not talk about consulting democracy. The second point which he made was that this House has got a mandate, in spite of what the Prime Minister says, to nationalise the coalfields. On that, opinions may or may not differ but, if the House has a mandate, then clearly, it has a mandate to prolong its own life. His fourth point was that it had not. So his points, one by one, are all mutually destructive.
I want to say only one other thing about his speech. There are few people who entered political life as early as the hon. Baronet, who dare face the Hansard reports of the period before the war. There are very few parties in this House

that dare face real impartial criticism of what took place before the war. There are few of us who can honestly say, in our own hearts, that we did not commit some error or some mistake, and when the hon. Baronet points to one party rather than another he is doing his own intellectual integrity rather less than justice. The real fact of the matter is that many mistakes are made by men of good heart, and good friends of democracy on all sides of the House, and the hon. Baronet, in his hatred for the Conservative Party, reminds me of the dislike of the lunatic for something which is really sane.

Mr. Muff: I listened with great interest to the hon. Baronet, and as one who is at least a sparking-plug on this side of the House, I should like to give the reasons why I support the Second Reading of this Bill. The hon. Baronet gave us a very interesting discourse upon mandates, but I believe, and I say this with all sincerity, he tripped himself up because he justified a mandate, when it suited his own outlook and what he himself agreed with. I do not wish to speak at length upon constitutional issues but for the last 100 years Parliaments have been elected and have very quickly done things for which one could say they have no mandate. But I want the House to pass the Second Reading because when we do have an election, I, at any rate, want it to be a real reflex of the opinion of the electors of this country. The one drawback I see in the Bill as it is drafted, is that it does not give about 3,000,000 men and women who are in the Fighting Forces abroad, a chance of registering their opinions in the election of a new Parliament. That is, I think, most regrettable because if there is any section of the community entitled to have a real voice in the election of a new Parliament it is the men and women who, as I understand the Bill, will not be able to vote at all. [An HON. MEMBER: "Which Bill?"] The Bill we are discussing, for the prolongation of the life of Parliament.
I do not wish to enter further into any discussion with the hon. Baronet or even his co-partner, the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher) except to say that this Parliament, with all its deficiencies, has endeavoured to interpret the will of the people so far as it could be ascertained. That is the reason why we have


enjoyed the confidence of the great mass of the electors, and I say that advisedly. We have enjoyed the confidence of most of the electors because, if there was in this House a keen and considerable minority opposing the war and all that it meant, this House would be bound to be dissolved, and there would have to be an election.
Therefore, I am not afraid of an election when it comes, but I hope it will be a real reflex of the opinions of the country. The hon. Member for Wood Green (Mr. Baxter) mentioned what the young people are thinking; I can tell the hon. Member that he is out of step with the modern trend of affairs, because young people are thinking on new lines and in new ways, and some of us are going to have the surprise of our lives if we endeavour to be merely stand-pat politicians. We are going to vote ourselves a little bit longer life, but that does not mean that we have to sit back and do nothing. It is our duty to prepare for the election, and it is our duty to the new electors to see that they get a square deal whenever that election comes along.

Mr. Magnay: I did not intend to take any part in this discussion, important as it is, until I heard the hon. Baronet the Member for Barnstaple (Sir R. Acland) hold forth in his usual way. I wondered then how the leader of the noble party of two had the audacity to stand up and tell this House that it did not know what it was thinking or talking about. He said he is in receipt of letters from young people serving at are front; so am I, and my own flesh and blood. They write to me from all the Services and in the plainest terms. Their advice—it is the province of young people always to advise, and that is why we are so well behaved and well conducted—is that the first thing we have to do is to support the Prime Minister in the winning of the war. How the hon. Gentleman can say anything else is beyond me and beyond, I should imagine, the intellect of any man and woman in this country. This camouflaged Communist—because that is all he is—

Mr. Gallacher: No. On a point of Order. I have been the subject of many attacks from one direction and another in this House, but I think you should draw the line, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, and say that this attack is uncalled for.

Mr. Magnay: I am quoting the law and the testimony. I have seen the pamphlets issued from tile office of Common Wealth, a name they have pinched. People think they are something to do with the great Empire policy, but they are nothing of the kind. It is just camouflaged Communism.

Mr. Gallacher: The hon. Member is talking silly nonsense.

Mr. Magnay: I am prepared—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Milner): The House is not discussing the principles of the Common Wealth Party.

Mr. Magnay: I am very glad to hear it. It will make my speech shorter. I thought that the hon. Gentleman's remarks were of slight moment, and I am glad to note from your observations that it is not at all necessary to say anything more upon the speech of a man who dares to stand up and declare that the country is in his favour when I, who have taken part in every by-election, know that all his candidates are well beaten and have lost their deposits. That is what a cross-section of the country thinks of his party.

Sir R. Acland: I want to correct the hon. Member on one simple question of fact. We have never lost a deposit.

Mr. Magnay: Then you should have done. After all the money you have spent and the lies you have told, you should have done far better than you have.

Sir R. Acland: Are we to be accused of lying?

Mr. William Brown: On a point of Order. This Debate at present is doing us little credit. Is it in Order for a Member to accuse another of lying?

Mr. Magnay: I did not accuse him; I accused his party. There are some respectable Members of his party, and I did not blacken the whole lot.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: If in fact the hon. Member did accuse another hon. Member of lying, he should certainly withdraw.

Mr. Magnay: I never intended to accuse him of that. I said that his party did it. If I have said anything personal, of course, I apologise to the House and to


the hon. Member. What is the purpose of this Bill? It is to see that as soon as possible the electors of this country have the opportunity of expressing their free vote, secretly. What alternative have we to the Bill? In my opinion, buttressed as it has been from all over the country, those who think the country will go Left are far mistaken. The country is going right, as it always does in times of crisis. I am certain, not only from letters I have received from young people, my own kith and kin at the front, but from opinions I have heard all over the country, that the Prime Minister has public opinion behind him. I am convinced that the Coalition Government will be kept in power by the women of this country. We men are sentimentalists, but the women are realists and know on which side their bread is buttered. You cannot argue with a prophet; you must either believe or disbelieve him, and I say—mark my words—the women will say "If it took Coalition Government to win this conflict, it will take Coalition Government to win the peace."

The Attorney-General (Sir Donald Somervell): I have—[HON. MEMBERS: "Is this the reply?"]—I have no power to stop the discussion, of course, but it seemed to me that it might be to the convenience of the House if I said a few words at this stage. This Bill is very apt, as we saw to some extent last year, when a similar Bill was before the House, to start discussions of a general character, on which it is impossible for the last word to be said in the course of the Debate. But if one comes back to the Bill, I believe that the vast majority of the House think that this is a right Bill for us to pass at this time. I also believe that the general opinion in the country is behind the House in taking measures to see that we are not forced to have a General Election at this time. That really is a question which falls to be considered on the Second Reading of the Bill. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Barnstaple (Sir R. Acland) dealt with a number of topics. He said at one stage that we were not prepared to face the issue. I cannot myself quite follow what the issue was, but I gather he is against the Bill. He is entitled to his own opinions, and one thing is clear from his speech—nothing that I could say in a few minutes would lead

him to alter his opinion. On the other hand, I think that the vast majority of the House are in favour of the Measure.
I would like to say a word or two about the speech made by the hon. Member for Wood Green (Mr. Baxter) and would like to join in what my right hon. Friend said in introducing the Bill, that the Government, and I am certain every Member of the House too, regard this Measure and its proposals as being of a very serious nature. We realise fully, and it is right that the country should know, that neither the House nor the Government regard it as anything lightly to be done. In this, as in other matters, you have to look at all the circumstances, and the arguments on one side and the other, and, looking at both, we have come to the conclusion that in the circumstances, at this time it is the right course to take. There is no reason that you can pick out as final and conclusive. There are a number of reasons. The hon. Baronet reminded the House of what I was very familiar with, because I have been present at all these Debates, that the reasons to some extent have changed. They have. You have to look each year as the time comes near at the then circumstances; they are not only purely physical circumstances, such as the black-out. But the question the House has to decide is whether the country wants to be forced into a general election by the passing of time.
I would like to say a word or two on Clause 2, dealing with Northern Ireland. It arose last year when this Clause came up, and it seems again that this is really a simple question. The Clause does not, as the hon. Gentleman the Member for West Belfast (Mr. J. Beattie), by a slip once or twice, said, in itself extend the length of the life of the Parliament of Northern Ireland.

Mr. J. Beattie: That is true, but it gives an opening to other people to extend it.

The Attorney-General: We are not by this Bill extending the length of life of the Parliament of Northern Ireland, but we are giving them the chance to do it themselves. I understand there may be differences inside the Parliament of Northern Ireland whether it is the right thing to do or not. There are some differences in this House. The hon. Member for Barnstaple thinks we ought not to do it. Like every other matter, this has to be discussed and debated and, if necessary,


decided by a Division. It may be that in Northern Ireland there are a larger number of people who are against the continuance of the Northern Ireland Parliament's life. That Parliament, like this, must discuss the matter, if necessary vote upon it and take their decision. If we had a considerable minority here against extending our life, we should discuss it and if necessary divide, and the majority decision would prevail. Why should we withold from the Parliament of Northern Ireland power that we should certainly claim if we had not got it—and we have—and can exercise ourselves? This is a step we are taking ourselves, a step which we considered and decided on, and all that the Bill does is to see that the Parliament of Northern Ireland has the same right of debate and decision.

Mr. Beattie: And leave the minority at the mercy of the majority?

The Attorney-General: The minority in this House is always at the mercy of the majority. That is the only way a democratic Assembly can work.

Mr. Beattie: Twenty-three years in power.

The Attorney-General: No, the Parliament of Northern Ireland was not elected 23 years ago; it was elected in 1938, five years ago. By this Clause we are giving the Parliament of Northern Ireland power which they would not otherwise have to take the course which we think right in the present circumstances. If they think it right, they will no doubt take it.

Mr. Stephen: I wish to intervene in the Debate because I and my colleagues represent the Opposition to the Government and have done so from the formation of the Government. I recognise that with the electoral roll as it is at present there is need for the prolongation of Parliament, at least until the new roll comes into operation. I think that the hon. Member for Barnstaple (Sir R. Acland) would agree that it would be a great mistake to have an election on the old roll. The country would not have the opportunity of sending to Parliament the people they wished to send. The special point I wish to make, however, is that a General Election is coming near. Not so very many months will pass before this country will have a General Election. In those circumstances

I claim that the Opposition should at least have the same opportunity of putting its case to the country. The Opposition has been denied this opportunity since the formation of this Government in 1940. Indeed, since 1939 it has been denied the chance of going to the microphone and using the B.B.C. as it has been used by the Government to forward their own policy. I was anxious to intervene before the Attorney-General concluded the Debate on behalf of the Government to ask for an assurance that the Opposition to the Government should have its opportunity of presenting its criticism of the policy and administration of the Government in view of the possibility of a General Election at no distant date. It is intolerable that the people of the country should not have an opportunity of knowing the point of view of those who feel that the Government, from the day they took power, have acted wrongly and have needlessly prolonged the war because of the way in which they have conducted the political side of it. It is intolerable that they should not have an opportunity of having presented to them the way in which the Government have betrayed them in refusing to make the necessary social reforms.
There are all the old people who have been denied decent pensions, there are the soldiers, sailors and airmen, who could have had an improvement in their conditions if the Opposition had had its opportunity of going to the microphone and making its case. I ask that the Government should relax the rule they have made that no one who is in opposition to the Government shall be allowed the privilege of going to the B.B.C. and stating the case that is to be made against them.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: That is clearly irrelevant.

Mr. Stephen: Surely, if this House is to take the decision to prolong Parliament for another 12 months, the Opposition should at least have an opportunity of asking the Government whether, if they agree to the prolongation of Parliament, they will have an opportunity of presenting their criticism of the Government through the one instrument which gives an opportunity of reaching the millions of the country. Much has been said with regard to the records of various parties in the past. I think my own party has acted and spoken consistently throughout these


years. We were strong opponents of Fascism. We brought to the attention of the Government the dangers that would accrue with the development of Fascism in the world and the need for the adoption of a policy for its overthrow. We have taken a line that has been consistent throughout. We believe that the Government have been a complete failure, and I hope they will no longer adopt the mean, cowardly policy they have adopted but will allow the Opposition to state their views freely to the people of the country and let them decide between us.

Mr. Loverseed: I am not apologising, as on the last occasion I spoke, for intervening in the Debate, because I feel on this occasion that I am one of the very few Members who have received a mandate from the electorate during the war. I came into the House believing and understanding that the House was very tolerant of sincerely held views. For that reason I was very disappointed at what I consider to be a disgraceful exhibition of partial affection from the other side while my hon. Friend the Member for Barnstaple (Sir R. Acland) was speaking. No one can say that his views are insincere. I cannot help feeling that this House does not represent the mood of this country to-day. The present House was elected in 1935, which was a year of moral cowardice, when the mood of the country was "Keep out of war; peace at any price." I cannot help remembering that in 1936, when I and thousands of others were in Spain fighting Fascism, this present House of Commons was by its non-intervention policy supporting Fascism in that country. The hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) rightly stated that many views have changed since those times. Almost in the same breath he claimed that the hon. Member for Barnstaple should have gone to his electors to seek a mandate from them for his change of views. Has the hon. Member for Oxford sought a mandate from his electors if his views have changed?

Mr. Gallacher: From Fascist to anti-Fascist.

Mr. Loverseed: There can scarcely be anyone in this country who does not seek a most vigorous prosecution of this war to a successful conclusion against Hitler

and Nazism—no one can hold that against us. We feel that for the successful prosecution of the war certain measures are urgently necessary. In 1940, when the Labour Party entered the Government, a pledge was given that property would be conscripted equally with lives. We claim that the time is long overdue when certain things should be taken over and used in the interest of the nation at war. The Prime Minister stated the other day that he cannot do that without a mandate. Did he ask for a mandate from this country to conscript lives? Lives have been taken in abundance. As regards the present Bill, we in this country have the Mother of Parliaments, and yet in every one of our Dominions a general election has been held since this war started. I do not think anyone can say that has brought about a lessening of the war effort in those Dominions, and it is utterly wrong that-we in this country should lag behind those Dominions, to whom we seek to set an example. I cannot conclude without a reference to the speech of the hon. Member for Gateshead (Mr. Magnay), in which he made what I consider were some most unjust statements against the party to which I belong. He stated that we had lost our deposits in one or two by-elections.

Mr. Magnay: I proved all those assertions from the speeches made by the hon. Baronet and a pamphlet issued from your headquarters, and there is no question about it.

Mr. Loverseed: I deplore that those things should enter into a Debate of this sort. I can only conclude by saying that if the electors of this country do not feel as many others on this side of the House feel, that a change is necessary, then we would, as the hon. Member for Gateshead said, lose our deposits at every election we fought, as would every Independent candidate. I feel that I cannot do otherwise, in view of the mandate I have received from the electors, than to oppose this Bill to-day.

Mr. William Brown: I am afraid that ale remarks I shall make today will not commend themselves to the acceptance of the House, but it is the first characteristic of a democratic Assembly that it should be willing to listen to unpopular views and to regard as equally sincere as the majority those who express a minority view. I wish to oppose the


Bill and to do so on four grounds. I will state these grounds at the beginning, in order that you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, may be aware of the ground I would desire to cover and that the House may more easily follow the arguments I would like to address to them. The four grounds on which I oppose this Bill are, first, that this Parliament is out of touch with and utterly unrepresentative of the people of Britain to-day; the second ground is that a continuance of this Parliament in the light of the recent pronouncement of the Prime Minister in the coal Debate would in my view be dangerous to the prosecution of this war to a successful conclusion: the third reason is that a continuance of this Parliament would result in our facing the problems of peace abroad and at home utterly unprepared for them; and the fourth reason is that there is a grave risk that a continuance of the life of this Parliament will result in social upheaval in Britain within a short period of time.
Those are the four arguments I desire to advance and to which I would wish to speak. In the Debate on the similar last year I elaborated the first of these four points. I pointed out that this Parliament was elected eight years ago, that when it was elected it was elected largely under false pretences, that is to say, it was elected on a programme to which everyone of its subsequent actions gave the lie; thirdly, out of the large number of vacancies, altogether some 220, which have occurred in this House since the General Election a very large proportion has been filled without a contest by a process of nomination by tile party caucuses. Those three reasons are as true to-day, or rather more so—they are one year truer than they were a year ago. But there has been an additional piece of evidence as regards the unrepresentative character of this House deriving from the results of recent by-elections. In the last 18 months we have had a number of elections. Newark, Rugby, Wallasey, Malden and Eddisbury may tell only part of this story, but there are five or six seats with great Conservative majorities, predominantly agricultural, the kind of seat that was regarded as safe for the Tory Party for ever—gone, either to Independents or to Common Wealth candidates. That is only half the story. The other half of the story is that in all kinds of other seats like King's Lynn, Peter-

borough, Chippenham, if those seats, had been fought on an up-to-date register those seats would have been lost. I venture to assert that granted two conditions to-day, an up-to-date register and a reasonably good candidate, there is hardly a seat in Britain to-day which is safe from the Government point of view. The silence with which that remark is treated is the best evidence of its truth.
So much for the first argument, that this House is an unrepresentative House of Commons. I want to say that the House is not the same as it was last year or even a month ago. Since then we have had a declaration from the Prime Minister as to what this House without an election may or may not do. In order to avoid getting into hot water in any way, I want to make it plain that I am not going to discuss the coal issue, on which the speech of the Prime Minister was made, so far as it relates to the problem which we are discussing to-day, which is, Should the life of this Parliament be extended or should it not? The Prime Minister's speech has a very great bearing on that point. What did he say? I do not pretend to quote verbatim, but I give the sense, which was, "On anything which is essential to the war we will do whatever is required, controversial or uncontroversial. On anything which is not essential to the war, we will do nothing controversial, and we may only proceed with the general consent of the House of Commons." I think that is a fair summary, although it is not a verbatim quotation, of what the Prime Minister said. I am not going to quarrel with that statement.
Far be it from me, an Independent, to quarrel with the Prime Minister on the interpretation of the deal between the party caucuses which this House to-day represents. I shall merely take that statement at its face value. What does it imply? It implies that in the mind of the Prime Minister some issues can be distinguished from others in the prosecution of the war. Some are essential to the war and some are not. That is the implication. That is a complete denial of the premise of totalitarian war. The essence of the conception of totalitarian war is that there is no phase of the national life and activities which is not essential to the war and which does not better its prosecution. Therefore, I say


that if it follows from the Prime Minister's statement that there are many phases of this war that we cannot deal with, the domestic phases, because they are controversial and because this House cannot be controversial without an election, I say that that establishes the case for a General Election at the earliest possible moment.
My third argument is that the continuance of this Parliament will result in our being, as a country, quite unready to deal With the problems of peace, that is to say, the problems of peace abroad and at home. The nearer we get to victory, the more plain it is that there is a difference between ourselves and our Allies, and a difference within this country, as to the war for which we are fighting. I shall not attempt to discuss the merits of those differences, because I should be out of Order. It is enough for my purposes to demonstrate that they exist and to argue that only a new Parliament can deal with them. Russia is not fighting this war to put a Darlan in place of a Pétain or a Badoglio in place of a Mussolini, to fulfil the Prime Minister's expressed desire to put King Peter back on the throne of Yugoslovia or King George back on the throne of Greece. Russia is not fighting to put back the obsolete and decadent monarchies of Europe. I venture to say that seven-tenths of the people of this country agree with Russia on that. Only a general election can give us a new House of Commons and a new Government in harmony with the will of Britain in regard to the objects of the war and the making of the peace. This present Parliament, three-quarters of whose seats are still occupied by the men of Munich, cannot act as the interpreter of the will of the people of this country in the making of the peace. No one can doubt that the transition from war to peace is going to be a graver and more difficult problem even than that transition was at the end of the last war. This war has eaten more deeply and in more directions into our national life than the last war did. Some of us remember how badly the boat was rocked in 1921. We have on record the present Prime Minister's statement and the statement of Lord Birkenhead as to how grave the position was in 1921 and how near we were to shipwreck. Our problem at the end of this war is going to be still more difficult and dangerous.
Is there one among us, Conservative, Liberal, Common Wealth or Labour, who can affirm that we are ready for the problems of peace? Dead silence is the answer. Is there one who believes that this Parliament can prepare for the problems of peace? There is no reply. My answer is, "No." I hope Members on all sides will agree with me here, because I do not believe that on these matters any one of us has a monopoly of vice or of virtue. I listen to Members on all sides asking for a statement of Government policy on the Scott Report, on the Uthwatt Report, on post-war agriculture, on housing; and no one, on whatever side of the House he sits, gets an adequate reply. We do not get a reply because, within the limits of this Government and of this Parliament, no reply is possible. This is not a Government; it is a perilous disequilibrium, a thing which has no roots; it is an illegitimate union; and it can give no answer whatever to the questions of post-war reconstruction at home any more than it can to the problems of peace abroad. Labour Ministers know that this is true, and I challenge them to deny it. If it be the case—I do not say that it is: I ask the question—that in order to get a proper post-war settlement there must be radical change. If that be so, it follows that there is some vested interest or other injured by the proposed change. As soon as an interest is injured by the proposed change, it becomes a controversial point, and this House under the dictum of the Prime Minister cannot deal with it without first having a General Election.
My fourth and last reason is that a continuance of this House threatens this country with a grave prospect of social upheaval. I do not want to be misunderstood here. I do not want to see social upheaval in Britain. I do not know how many shared the experience with me, but I had an experience in Russia of war, revolution and civil war, and whatever tribute I pay—and I do pay it to the tremendous contribution of the Russians in this war—I do not wish to see in England what I saw in Russia in 1927.

Mr. Gallacher: Why?

Mr. Brown: I could reply to that, but if I did, I should be out of Order. I can only say that I hope and believe that there is a more excellent way open to the people of this country than to go through that ordeal. I do not want to


see such an upheaval and therefore I am not making this argument because—

Mr. Gallacher: The hon. Member says in 1927. Is it not the case that, however difficult the situation was, the people of Russia were provided with opportunities for advancement, that never could have been given to them under Czardom and therefore the Russian people had a big advantage?

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I hope that that argument will not be followed up by the hon. Member.

Mr. Brown: I am not going to attempt to pursue that argument. I am not denying that there have been very great advantages in Russia. I am only postulating that I hope we shall get the same or even better results without going through what I saw with my own eyes in that country. I hold the view that the people of this country as a whole are averse to social upheaval and that there are two trends in our own people which, so long as they do not get too divorced, are an effective guarantee against violence and upheaval. The first strain is the Saxon strain, which does not know very much about formal law but rests upon a rough equity between man and man. [Interruption.] There is no need for my hon. Friend to proclaim the obvious. There is a second strain, derived from the Romans and the Normans—the love of law and order. As long as these two things march together, this people is perhaps the most peaceful and law-abiding people in the world, but when the gap between those things gets too wide, there is no people in the world capable of more explosion than the people of this country. I argue against the continuance of this Parliament and for an immediate General Election because I believe that the continuance of this Parliament will result in the gap between rough equity and law and order becoming so wide that at the end you may face the prospect of social upheaval.
Those are the four arguments I have advanced, and I hope the House will agree that they are at least relevant and worthy of serious consideration, whether the House agrees with them or not. What is the case for the Bill against the serious and grave arguments I have advanced? We are told that we cannot have an election in war-time. But this is only in Britain. We can have an election in

America, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, Canada and even Northern Ireland, but we cannot have an election here in Britain. It is nonsense.

Mr. Glenvil Hall: Look at the map; that will tell you why.

Mr. Brown: I am grateful for the hon. Member's advice. If I could receive an assurance that he had looked at one, I would follow his advice.

Dr. Morgan: That is very cheap.

Mr. Brown: One can understand that a change of Government might be very distressing to the occupants of the Front Bench. A pyramid looks very good if you are sitting on the top of it, but it does not look half so good when that pyramid is sitting on top of you. Every change of Government we have had in war-time in this and the last war has, on the whole, been a change for the better. In 1916, when there was a change in wartime, it was a change for the better. The change in 1940 was a change for the better as compared with what existed before and I see no reason to suppose that if Britain now had the opportunity of a General Election and decided upon a change of Government, the result need be worse than what we have to-day. If Britain did decide on a change of Government, that would prove up to the hilt the point advanced during this Debate, namely, that this House has ceased to represent the people of Britain. I have spoken longer than I intended, but against the grave argument of policy which I have tried to advance here to-day we have had what I can only describe as "mechanics' defects." We have had a tradesman's argument, a narrow, limited argument that we cannot have an election in wartime. Nonsense, Of course you can have one if you want one, and whether you want one or not depends upon whether you think there is need for bringing the House into line with popular opinion in Britain and beginning to face the problems of peace. I believe that is necessary, and, therefore, I oppose the Bill which is before the House.

Question, "That the Bill be now read a Second time," put, and agreed to.

Bill read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the Whole House for the next Sitting Day.—[Mr. Beechman.]

RENT OF FURNISHED HOUSES CONTROL (SCOTLAND) [MONEY]

Considered in Committee, under Standing Order No. 69.

Resolved,
That for the purposes of any Act of the present Session to make provision with regard to the rent of houses or parts thereof in Scotland let at a rent which includes payment for the use of furniture or for attendance, it is expedient to authorise the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of the sums required for the payment of remuneration and salaries and allowances to the members, acting members, clerks and officers and servants of

Tribunals appointed under the said Act."—(King's Recommendation signified).—[Mr. Beechman].

Resolution to be reported upon the next Sitting Day.

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

It being after the hour appointed for the Adjournment of the House, Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.